On Good Friday with sea bass and goat cheeses, here is Riesling from a new Alsatian estate located rather outside the mainstream villages -
2019 Maison Moritz-Prado Riesling Terroir de Roche - France, Alsace (15/04/2022)
This is very recent estate owned since 2018 by a young Alsatian/Columbian couple. It is located at Albé at an altitude between 400 and 500 metres on shale soils further west into the Vosges mountains than most Alsatian wine villages. This very dry medium bodied Riesling is crisp, sharply focussed and very mineral with an attractively fragrant overlay of citrus fruit, some underlying gras and faint touches of varietally typical hydrocarbons which I love. It is delicious now but I guess that it may age gracefully in the medium term. Well worth repurchase at c.€14. Very good.
On Easter Sunday, we had starters, traditional Easter lamb with Spring vegetable followed by cheese and dessert. With hindsight I don't think Cos d'Estournel was the ideal pairing with the lamb. A plain cut of beef would have suited it better. The relative sweetness of the lamb and its vegetables would have called for a more Mediterranean wine, IMO.
NV P. Louis Martin Champagne Grand Cru Extra-Brut Bouzy - France, Champagne, Champagne Grand Cru (17/04/2022)
Crisp, fresh and with citrus type fragrance over medium body. A good apéritif bubbly and worth repurchase if I can still find it at its reasonable price of c.€27.
1996 Château Cos d'Estournel - France, Bordeaux, Médoc, St. Estèphe (17/04/2022)
Cos, with the exception of its 1953 and 1985, has never really captivated me. It tends to be robust and savoury but a bit short on the incredible elegance and charm of its equivalents from Pauillac, Saint-Julien and Margaux. This 1996 is a case in point. Still vigorous in colour and body, it was open for business on the nose and palate with savoury tinged fruit, good depth, earthy hints, smooth texture, good balancing acidity and still firm but ripe tannic structure supporting a decently long finish. There is plenty of life left here. So very good but it is missing that bit extra that I found in recent years in, say, Pichon-Lalande 1966 and Léoville-Poyferré 1982.
NV Graham Porto The Tawny - Portugal, Douro, Porto (17/04/2022)
Suave and nutty but not the most complex tawny. Good pairing with Shropshire cheese and fairly good with a chocolate dessert.
Posted from CellarTracker