WTN: Terrabianca, Arrowood, Swan, Troplong Mondot

[Jenise]

Some other wines from the past week:

1997 Terrabianca "La Fonte" red table wine
Tuscany

I bought six of these at auction for next to nothing about six months ago, and the first two were a bit tired. Last night I pulled another, and noted with dismay that the cork was protruding considerably, almost 1/4 of an inch. So of course I expected it to be totally dead. What a shock--it had more youthful color (ruddy dark red) than the first two, and drank better than either had though we did note that the tannins were creeping up on our second glasses. Still, a lovely wine with our pasta amatriciana: plum and dark berry fruit with leather, sandalwood, star anise, cinnamon incense and a little earth. I don't know if this was just an inordinately lucky bottle or if I didn't give the first two time enough to settle after shipping. Both could be true. Very good.


1993 Arrowwood Cabernet Sauvignon
Napa

A neighbor opened this wine the other night. Been awhile since I had a 93 Californian so I didn't know what to expect, but this bottle was very good. Not a swooner, but it's handling middle age very well: medium bodied, solid cab flavors, little in the way of secondary development.
Good.


1994 Swan Zinfandel "Ziegler"
Sonoma

It took a little while for this wine to open up. When it did: raspberry and Dr. Pepper with tangy acidity. After a bit of time in the glass, a bit of soy sauce flavor muddies up the finish which says the wine's past optimum, but it drinks well, however much it's rather inexcusable to keep a zinfandel this long. Whatever's good about that grape is best enjoyed in youth, methinks. Good.


1994 Troplong Mondot
St. Emilion

Another wine from the same cellar as the Arrowood, a wine I feared would be too young--I haven't touched a single 94 of my own yet--but it's not. I can't remember the last time I had a Troplong Mondot, but it's been so long that I haven't recognized that this wine should be one of my favorite St. Emilions. Perhaps I've avoided it because it's a Michel Rolland wine? Don't know, but loved what I tasted here. Largely merlot (65%), the plummy, cassis fruit gets fleshed out with herbs and spice from about equal amounts of cab, CF and malbec. Some minerality shows as well as some emerging secondary nuances. Excellent.

Jenise,
Thank you for the notes. I don't know the La Fonte, but I like Terrabianca a lot (the Campaccio Riserva is pretty woody, but the regular Campaccio is serious Sangiovese). Glad this one showed better than your others.

Glad the Troplong showed nicely. The ones I've had seemed like nice wines, but tannins were really intrusive. Glad to here they've integrated.

[Jenise]

Dale, I know what you mean. my first Terrabianca experience was the 90 vintage, and I bought both the regular (Garriques?) and the Riserva. Of the two, I preferred the Garriques.

I'd never heard of the La Fonte before I stumbled over it at auction. Weren't any other bidders--I kind of figured that the words "vino de tavola" in the title scared away the pointy people.

[David M. Bueker]

I had some '93 Arrowood reserve Cab a while back that was very good. They did well in '93. The Merlot was also good (perish the thought...)

[Jenise]

Perish? Back during the brief time when I used to get to taste them side by side annually (Dick and Elyse Arrowood came to Alaska every year and would throw a winemaker dinner so they could write off the trip), I often liked the merlot better than the cab. That also gave me the opportunity to discover that the reds are (or were) inconsistent in their aging ability, hence my surprise that the 93 had done this well.

It's going to be really cool having the Arrowood's owner in the neighborhood--he bought wines for years that he sent into storage, and then decided to buy a lot, build and move so he put off getting into the wine by about another four years. Lots of fun stuff there to try--he doesn't even remember buying half of them.