3 X 2

[MarkS]

(I still wonder why the pinot noir hasn't gotten better, but I suspect if it was planted on all the best sites and treated with the care with which riesling's treated, it might already have.)

Weird. Because isn't this doing much better in Germany nowadays?

 

[Thor]

Yes, it is. One possible conclusion is that the Alsatians (as a group, not individually) just don't care. They have sold an awful lot of really horrid pinot noir to the locals for years on end, so maybe that's a demotivating factor in the lack of change. And maybe the Germans got tired of hearing that their sptburgunders were crap and actually decided to do something about it. I don't know, this is all raw speculation. But it's true that a pinot lover can't really ignore Germany any longer, while Alsace remains eminently ignorable, in the main.

Joe, would you say that the pendulum is swinging back in the sense that the alcohol levels are actually coming down, or because the winemakers are getting a better handle on balancing the wine to handle that alcohol? I don't drink as widely as you in the region (who does, other than Michael Pronay?), but I haven't noticed them getting lighter, just more complete.

 

[SFJoe]

originally posted by Thor:
I don't drink as widely as you in the region (who does, other than Michael Pronay?)

Kirk Wallace, actually. I'm not nearly as comprehensive as I was a few years ago--the prices ran so far that I became less excited. But I think guys like FXP are backing off the extremes of ripeness that they hit in Y2K+/-3. Though they are not back to where they were in the early '90s.

Of course, the weather hasn't been that of the early '90s either.

 

[Scott Kraft]

originally posted by SFJoe:

originally posted by Jim Hanlon:

I expect you sourced them in France? We had to do some begging to get a bottle in Paris.

Yes. As a frequent rider of the NYC subways, my begging technique is quite advanced.

So the investment banking thing is doctorate work?