Cellar trip

Florida Jim

Florida Jim

Florida Jim
This past weekend I drove 1,500 miles (round-trip) in two days so that I could visit my wine cellar and come home with all sorts of choices.
My neighbor says I am a most particular man.
I never thought of it that way.

2006 Edmund Vatan, Sancerre Clos La Néore:
13% alcohol; prematurely oxidized, not to the point of sherry but sufficient to dampen the enjoyment of an otherwise excellent wine.

2009 Broc Cellars, Vine Starr:
13.3% alcohol; my wife loves this wine and, while I enjoy it, I’m still trying to figure out exactly why; maybe it’s the bright and penetrating nose or the strongly flavored palate that is laced with ample cut; what ever it is, this white brings plenty of flavor to the table with powerful acidity and no wood. Not a wine I want often but, on occasion, one that can’t be replaced.

1999 Hirtzberger, Grüner Veltliner Honivogl:
13.5% alcohol; roses and pineapple on the nose with hints of resin and sea salt; much the same in the mouth where the floral notes keep it from cloying and the resinous quality delivers the “pong;” a long, integrated finish. If you are expecting power or punch, you will miss the beauty and almost lilting quality that this delivers. Greater than the sum of its parts. At, or very near, peak.
With pumpkin curry, symbiotic.

2005 Luneau-Papin, Muscadet Clos des Allées:
12% alcohol, cost on release was $13; fresh as mountain stream water, scented with flowers and citrus; tasting of mineral, citrus and almonds; thirst quenching, supple and beautifully balanced.
Day two: this is such an individual Muscadet; I really think that if I could only have one melon in my life it would be this, year in and year out; just glorious, engaging both the senses and the intellect and reminding me that good Muscadet is about energy. Wonderful wine!

2002 Clos de la Roilette, Fleurie Cuvée Tardive:
13% alcohol; not remotely Fleurie in delivery; that said, it is rich, dark, smells and tastes of Baker’s chocolate and earth, is more savory than sweet and is quite long. Very satisfying with burgers, oven fries and home-made coleslaw.

2004 Dom. Leroy, Bourgogne:
12.5% alcohol, this bottle was a ‘leaker’; swampy and stemmy on the nose although not without that sort of very old Burgundy appeal; sour in the mouth and not pleasant. Set aside for another day.
Day two: less aggressively stemmy, less fruit and more complex but still sour.
(Aside: One hopes this showing is as a result of the failed closure and not indicative of the wine itself.)

1994 Laurel Glen, Cabernet Sauvignon Sonoma Mountain:
12.5% alcohol, high neck fill, substantial sediment; warm fruit and bell pepper nose; in the mouth the bell pepper tends to destroy any impression of ripeness, its tannic and angular, showing minimal complexity; drying finish. Over the course of the evening the wine smoothed only marginally. This has neither developed nor softened with age and while it has some intellectual appeal, it rates low on the enjoyment scale.

2001 Edmunds St. John, Syrah Wylie-Fenaughty:
14.4% alcohol; like it was bottled yesterday; clear, singular and flamboyant boysenberry fruit nose; much the same in the mouth as the fruit is completely in charge and intense, the slightest hint of structure and good balance; medium finish. This wine has considerable cellar time to go before it develops complexity but it has the fruit for decades. With vegetable hash, very good, indeed.

1999 Dom. Fourrier, Gevrey-Chambertin Clos St. Jacques:
13.5% alcohol; ripe, red cherry nose with the faintest hint of mineral; similar on the palate in a medium bodied delivery that is straight-forward and clean with ripe, sweet fruit; a medium finish. Nothing here says Gevrey or the vineyard but rather, this tastes much like a very clean and medium bodied Russian River pinot from a good producer. No earthiness, no muscular impression, no elegance; no “there” there and an overall impression of sweetness. Good with assorted cheeses.
(Aside: I have had all of the Clos St. Jacques wines from 1999 save Clair’s and this is in the class with Esmonin; it does not even approach Rousseau’s or Jadot’s bottlings.)

Best, Jim
 
You are a most particular man. Good music in the car? Have one of those 04 Leroys sitting around too, from the year in which Mmme Bizebody infamously declassified. It will be a sad day if I wait a decade to crack it open and find it leaky.
 
Jim,

In a wine as young as that Vatan, how do you ascribe the problem to premox rather than heat in transit?

Which leads me to my second question. I wouldn't think of '99 Honivogl as being near peak. Was this from the same source?

Thanks.
 
originally posted by SFJoe:
Jim,

In a wine as young as that Vatan, how do you ascribe the problem to premox rather than heat in transit?

Which leads me to my second question. I wouldn't think of '99 Honivogl as being near peak. Was this from the same source?
Click to expand...

Vatan - bought 6 (from the same case), tried several, this one shot, others fine.

Honivogl - different source, bought a full case and have tried several times previous. All have been sound but development to date gives the impression this is at least one of its drinking windows.

Best, Jim
 
originally posted by Ian Fitzsimmons:
The Vatan is alarming. As Joe says, seems young for a p'ox diagnosis.
Click to expand...

I don't understand.
Wouldn't a wine have to be young to be 'prematurely' oxidized?
Best, Jim
 
originally posted by Florida Jim:
originally posted by Ian Fitzsimmons:
The Vatan is alarming. As Joe says, seems young for a p'ox diagnosis.
Click to expand...

I don't understand.
Wouldn't a wine have to be young to be 'prematurely' oxidized?
Best, Jim
Click to expand...
Perhaps it's seeking to distinguish between THE pox/premox [as, notoriously, in white Burgundy from the mid-90s] with its genesis assumed to be related to changed winemaking and possibly viticultural practices and something that is [just] oxidised for good old-fashioned reasons e.g. closure failure, bottleneck anomalies, accidental SO2 omission, excessive temperatures etc. Of course only a some of those are likely to be possible explanations for a dud bottle in a case of good ones.

Although the 06 Vatan is certainly earlier/younger and therefore 'prematurely', in the case of the pox there is [generally] at least 6 years before IT manifests itself although, since the full story is yet to be told/understood/agreed, who is to say that whatever is/are causing the phenomenon might not have changed for the worse from the earliest increasingly widespread manifestations in 2002/3. Hopefully not since certain producers have certainly taken steps to redress what was affecting the ageability of their wines.

I wonder though if Vatan changed anything in the relevant years that might have caused the early oxidation of the 2006 in question.

On the other hand in another forum not far away there is a thread about an allegedly prematurely oxidised/oxidising 2008 white Burgundy 1er Cru which is being discussed as poxed/premoxed [occasionally even pre-moxed] although that wine will have been in the bottle less than 2 years.

In any event its lousy luck with a great Sancerre in the penultimate vintage before the old master handed over to the next generation.
And thanks for the other TNs
 
originally posted by Florida Jim:
originally posted by Ian Fitzsimmons:
The Vatan is alarming. As Joe says, seems young for a p'ox diagnosis.
Click to expand...

I don't understand.
Wouldn't a wine have to be young to be 'prematurely' oxidized?
Best, Jim
Click to expand...

Right. P'ox in white Burgundy, per my anecdotal reading, seems to take six + years to show, e.g., it's just been starting to show in 04s fairly recently. My 'sampling' may be too idiosyncratic and you may have better info.
 
originally posted by nigel groundwater:
Perhaps it's seeking to distinguish between THE pox/premox [as, notoriously, in white Burgundy from the mid-90s] with its genesis assumed to be related to changed winemaking and possibly viticultural practices and something that is [just] oxidised for good old-fashioned reasons e.g. closure failure, bottleneck anomalies, accidental SO2 omission, excessive temperatures etc. Of course only a some of those are likely to be possible explanations for a dud bottle in a case of good ones.
Click to expand...

Ah, said the blind man.
Then lets say it was closure failure, or some such.
I doubt if Vatan changed anything - why in the world would he?
Best, Jim
 
Do you still have some of that $9 1999 Gilles Robin Crozes-Hermitage in your cellar? Haven't seen you post on that in a while. But at a certain point it seemed like you had pallets of the stuff.
 
originally posted by Rahsaan:
Do you still have some of that $9 1999 Gilles Robin Crozes-Hermitage in your cellar? Haven't seen you post on that in a while. But at a certain point it seemed like you had pallets of the stuff.
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Rahsaan,
That is the wine that I had more of then any other. All the 750's are gone (5 or 6 cases, I think) but one magnum remains.
Best, Jim
 
5 or 6 cases. I guess when it's $9, that is tempting. Will be interesting to see how the magnum shows when you open it. I remember enjoying that wine as well but the producer quickly dropped off of my radar and I never see it anymore.
 
originally posted by Florida Jim:
originally posted by nigel groundwater:
Perhaps it's seeking to distinguish between THE pox/premox [as, notoriously, in white Burgundy from the mid-90s] with its genesis assumed to be related to changed winemaking and possibly viticultural practices and something that is [just] oxidised for good old-fashioned reasons e.g. closure failure, bottleneck anomalies, accidental SO2 omission, excessive temperatures etc. Of course only a some of those are likely to be possible explanations for a dud bottle in a case of good ones.
Click to expand...

Ah, said the blind man.
Then lets say it was closure failure, or some such.
I doubt if Vatan changed anything - why in the world would he?
Best, Jim
Click to expand...
My query on the possibility of Vatan changing anything was badly expressed since I was trying to suggest it was very unlikely and that, like you, I very much doubt he changed anything, particularly, in the twilight of his great career and for that reason your oxidising bottle was not part of the pox phenomenon even though it was certainly ‘premature’ in the light of the performance of Vatan’s wines generally.

As you know the pox is widespread and generally believed to be a function of 'changes' made in the mid-90s and although there have been huge threads dedicated to the cause/s and a multitude of studies, some completed some still underway, there is still no final consensus re cause/s or agreed remedies.

Of course I was only trying to rationalise the questioning in this thread of your perfectly reasonable characterisation of the state of the wine as ‘prematurely oxidised’. It was Jim - but not as some know it :)
 
Nigel,
Speaking of those endless threads elsewhere, I read some of Don Cornwell's comments on the subject (the pox that is, not the general observation) and found them interesting but not fully satisfying.

For example:
"I continue to believe that the premox crisis originates primarily from deliberate choices made by winemakers to produce more fruit-forward wines designed to be more attractive at an earlier age, including: (1) lowering S02 levels; (2) widespread adoption of computer-controlled bladder presses and the use of very gentle pressing cycles with those computer-controlled presses which lowered flavonoid phenol extraction; and (3) in a few instances (e.g. Sauzet and Verget) use of extended post-M/L batonnage and failure to monitor/adjust SO2 levels during this process. All three of these factors have been listed by the BIVB as factors they claim to have verified with their ongoing research. On the other hand, BIVB has been adamant that cork treatments and bleaching have had no net effect. (Yes, we would all like to see the data that supposedly supports these conclusions.)"

Perhaps, some of these on-going studies will be more helpful.
Best, Jim
 
originally posted by Florida Jim:

Vatan - bought 6 (from the same case), tried several, this one shot, others fine.
Click to expand...

So, apart from Pox or closure failure, you don't think now is just an awkward stage in its evolution? I ask from the interested position of having pulled one from storage but not pulled the cork...
 
originally posted by Cliff:
originally posted by Florida Jim:

Vatan - bought 6 (from the same case), tried several, this one shot, others fine.
Click to expand...

So, apart from Pox or closure failure, you don't think now is just an awkward stage in its evolution? I ask from the interested position of having pulled one from storage but not pulled the cork...
Click to expand...

I like sherry.
I think I'm pretty sensitive to an oxidized wine. If I ruled out the oxidized stuff (as tho one could) the wine was still flavorful.
Oxidized smells and flavors are not what I think of when I think of an awkward stage.
That said, your bottle may be just fine.
Best, Jim
 
I'm still trying to get a handle on the evolutionary trajectory. I've only had a couple and gather these live forever. You like them throughout their lifespan?
 
originally posted by Cliff:
I'm still trying to get a handle on the evolutionary trajectory. I've only had a couple and gather these live forever. You like them throughout their lifespan?
Click to expand...
'Not enough experience to say.
The ones I've had, I've liked - save this one.
Best, Jim
 
2002 Clos de la Roilette, Fleurie Cuvée Tardive:
13% alcohol; not remotely Fleurie in delivery; that said, it is rich, dark, smells and tastes of Baker’s chocolate and earth, is more savory than sweet and is quite long. Very satisfying with burgers, oven fries and home-made coleslaw.
Click to expand...
I've taste this wine several times and it's a funny one. I agree: it doesn't taste much like Beaujolais cru, but on the other hand it's a very nice wine and well structured. Kind of reminded me of Navarra or Rioja somehow.
 
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