Salil Benegal
Salil Benegal
Jayson Cohen, Seth Rosenberg, and I battled traffic and PATH scheduling issues to meet Jay Miller at the Grand Sichuan on Grove St. in Jersey City. The food was excellent, though perhaps a bit milder than we expected, and we had some outstanding wines.
2018 Wittmann Westhofener Brunnenhauschen Riesling Großes Gewächs
This needed a lot of air and popping and pouring this wasn't the wisest move - a glass much later in the night showed much better and provided more interest, even though the wine was a bit warmer by that point. It's an impressive wine with plenty of ripe white fruited flavours, sweeter floral notes, and a firm stony mineral base underneath, showing more richness and sweetness than I typically expect from GGs. This is well made, but doesn't show any of the sheer joie de vivre or provide the visceral enjoyment I got from the '21 Wittmann Morstein Kabinett recently (at a fraction of the price of this.)
2020 Schloss Lieser Graacher Domprobst Riesling Kabinett Auction
Kabinett my ass - this has the weight and intensity of a rich Spätlese, bordering Auslese. But labeling aside, this is delicious. The fruit flavours span a spectrum ranging from riper white cherry and peachy flavours to the more classic Mosel apple and citrus notes, augmented by an array of floral, lightly honeyed, and gentle mineral notes. Generous sweetness here but it's balanced by bright acids, and the whole package is incredibly easy to drink.
1982 Ch“teau Prieuré-Lichine
Leftovers from a bottle that Seth opened a day before. It's still holding up quite nicely, though doesn't show quite the same array of aromatic depth Seth described from day 1. The red fruited flavours here are quite gentle and play a supporting role to more savoury dried floral, herbal, and faintly leathery elements. Feels fully mature and perhaps slightly on the downslope, with the structure fully integrated here, and a graceful, silky texture on a mediumweight frame.
2006 Domaine Robert Chevillon Nuits St. Georges 1er Cru Les Saint Georges
Just a stunning bottle of Burgundy - a hauntingly complex and beautiful fragrance, a palate that's so graceful and polished with fine grained tannin beneath, and somehow it keeps getting better and better with air. There's no sense trying to describe the various flavour components, because this is so much more than the sum of all the various flavours - I'll just say it seems to show equal parts fruit, earth, and more savoury developed tertiary notes, with everything coming together into a seamless whole.
2001 Bruno Giacosa Barbaresco Santo Stefano
Seth said he decanted this around 9 AM, and about 9 hours later it was only just starting to open out. First impressions were of a wine that was still somewhat tight, showing a beautiful core of red and dark fruited flavours accented by savoury herbal, floral, and tarry notes, but with a firm tannic spine dominating on the back end. Still more air helped ease out the tannin a bit more (though it never entirely relents), and brought out more aromatic depth as the various non-fruited elements became more prominent around the core of bright fruit. Lovely wine - even if it needs a lot more time to be 'ready', I'm glad for the opportunity to drink it now.
1993 Von Schubert Maximin Grünhäuser Abtsberg Riesling Auslese
Seemed heat-damaged, or at the very least unreasonably advanced and not representative of what this wine should be. Tastes more like stale apple juice than anything I would expect in a mature Riesling.
1990 Von Schubert Maximin Grünhäuser Herrenberg Riesling Spätlese
I'd say this is near the platonic ideal of aged Spätlese for me, but Seth kept insisting that he had a bottle recently from the same lot that was somehow even better (!) than this. But this was just thrilling; the fruit still remarkably fresh and vibrant with that electric '90 acidity beneath giving it plenty of lift, layers of more savoury smoky, honeyed, and creamy flavours, and those more herbal, faintly minty, and pine cone-like notes I always find in older Von Schubert. Incredible balance and depth, very much a wow wine.
2017 Dönnhoff Niederhäuser Hermannshöhle Riesling Auslese Goldkapsel
Quite the contrast to the Grünhäus that preceded it - whereas that was all crackling electricity and vibrancy, this is a gentler, quieter wine. Beautiful aromatics - riper peach and white cherry mixed with tarter lime and pear fruit, and gentle floral and honeyed accents. The palate is very similar, dominated by the youthful fruit with a mineral undercurrent that becomes more apparent on the back end. Lovely wine, the kind of Auslese that's perfect at the table with food, rather than a botrytis-heavy dessert wine.
1995 Müller-Catoir Mußbacher Eselshaut Rieslaner Auslese
Of course, Seth brought an old Catoir, and the only question was whether he'd bring a Riesling, Scheurebe, or Rieslaner. Ludicrous amounts of sweetness and richness; absurdly high acidity; somehow it all comes into balance and it works. I have no idea how, other than that Hans-Gunter Schwarz is a wizard. It's packed with ripe tropical fruit, those fiery spicy notes of Rieslaner (and the slightly rough phenolic texture I usually associate with it), layers of botrytised honey and caramelly sweetness, and the whole package is just spectacular - intensely rich and sweet, yet feeling absolutely electric and shockingly light on its feet.
Equipo Navazos La Bota de Pedro Ximenez 12
Yup, this is PX. Motor oil color/consistency; intensely powerful; lots of raisiny, chocolatey, and figgy goodness here. Absolutely delicious and I even reached for a second glass (something I rarely do with PX, given the sheer intensity).
2018 Wittmann Westhofener Brunnenhauschen Riesling Großes Gewächs
This needed a lot of air and popping and pouring this wasn't the wisest move - a glass much later in the night showed much better and provided more interest, even though the wine was a bit warmer by that point. It's an impressive wine with plenty of ripe white fruited flavours, sweeter floral notes, and a firm stony mineral base underneath, showing more richness and sweetness than I typically expect from GGs. This is well made, but doesn't show any of the sheer joie de vivre or provide the visceral enjoyment I got from the '21 Wittmann Morstein Kabinett recently (at a fraction of the price of this.)
2020 Schloss Lieser Graacher Domprobst Riesling Kabinett Auction
Kabinett my ass - this has the weight and intensity of a rich Spätlese, bordering Auslese. But labeling aside, this is delicious. The fruit flavours span a spectrum ranging from riper white cherry and peachy flavours to the more classic Mosel apple and citrus notes, augmented by an array of floral, lightly honeyed, and gentle mineral notes. Generous sweetness here but it's balanced by bright acids, and the whole package is incredibly easy to drink.
1982 Ch“teau Prieuré-Lichine
Leftovers from a bottle that Seth opened a day before. It's still holding up quite nicely, though doesn't show quite the same array of aromatic depth Seth described from day 1. The red fruited flavours here are quite gentle and play a supporting role to more savoury dried floral, herbal, and faintly leathery elements. Feels fully mature and perhaps slightly on the downslope, with the structure fully integrated here, and a graceful, silky texture on a mediumweight frame.
2006 Domaine Robert Chevillon Nuits St. Georges 1er Cru Les Saint Georges
Just a stunning bottle of Burgundy - a hauntingly complex and beautiful fragrance, a palate that's so graceful and polished with fine grained tannin beneath, and somehow it keeps getting better and better with air. There's no sense trying to describe the various flavour components, because this is so much more than the sum of all the various flavours - I'll just say it seems to show equal parts fruit, earth, and more savoury developed tertiary notes, with everything coming together into a seamless whole.
2001 Bruno Giacosa Barbaresco Santo Stefano
Seth said he decanted this around 9 AM, and about 9 hours later it was only just starting to open out. First impressions were of a wine that was still somewhat tight, showing a beautiful core of red and dark fruited flavours accented by savoury herbal, floral, and tarry notes, but with a firm tannic spine dominating on the back end. Still more air helped ease out the tannin a bit more (though it never entirely relents), and brought out more aromatic depth as the various non-fruited elements became more prominent around the core of bright fruit. Lovely wine - even if it needs a lot more time to be 'ready', I'm glad for the opportunity to drink it now.
1993 Von Schubert Maximin Grünhäuser Abtsberg Riesling Auslese
Seemed heat-damaged, or at the very least unreasonably advanced and not representative of what this wine should be. Tastes more like stale apple juice than anything I would expect in a mature Riesling.
1990 Von Schubert Maximin Grünhäuser Herrenberg Riesling Spätlese
I'd say this is near the platonic ideal of aged Spätlese for me, but Seth kept insisting that he had a bottle recently from the same lot that was somehow even better (!) than this. But this was just thrilling; the fruit still remarkably fresh and vibrant with that electric '90 acidity beneath giving it plenty of lift, layers of more savoury smoky, honeyed, and creamy flavours, and those more herbal, faintly minty, and pine cone-like notes I always find in older Von Schubert. Incredible balance and depth, very much a wow wine.
2017 Dönnhoff Niederhäuser Hermannshöhle Riesling Auslese Goldkapsel
Quite the contrast to the Grünhäus that preceded it - whereas that was all crackling electricity and vibrancy, this is a gentler, quieter wine. Beautiful aromatics - riper peach and white cherry mixed with tarter lime and pear fruit, and gentle floral and honeyed accents. The palate is very similar, dominated by the youthful fruit with a mineral undercurrent that becomes more apparent on the back end. Lovely wine, the kind of Auslese that's perfect at the table with food, rather than a botrytis-heavy dessert wine.
1995 Müller-Catoir Mußbacher Eselshaut Rieslaner Auslese
Of course, Seth brought an old Catoir, and the only question was whether he'd bring a Riesling, Scheurebe, or Rieslaner. Ludicrous amounts of sweetness and richness; absurdly high acidity; somehow it all comes into balance and it works. I have no idea how, other than that Hans-Gunter Schwarz is a wizard. It's packed with ripe tropical fruit, those fiery spicy notes of Rieslaner (and the slightly rough phenolic texture I usually associate with it), layers of botrytised honey and caramelly sweetness, and the whole package is just spectacular - intensely rich and sweet, yet feeling absolutely electric and shockingly light on its feet.
Equipo Navazos La Bota de Pedro Ximenez 12
Yup, this is PX. Motor oil color/consistency; intensely powerful; lots of raisiny, chocolatey, and figgy goodness here. Absolutely delicious and I even reached for a second glass (something I rarely do with PX, given the sheer intensity).