Matt Latuchie
Matt Latuchie
The Cuvée Fontanéou from La Bastide Blanche is a mighty fine mourvedre - usually requiring a lot of patience.
Tempiers and fails
- Thread starter Saina Nieminen
- Start date
Saina Nieminen
Saina Nieminen
Kevin Roberts
Kevin Roberts
Thanks for the Pradeaux recommendations. I'll have to bury the bottle so I don't think about it anytime soon. Now what to drink with that leg of lamb...
Jeff Grossman
Jeff Grossman
Bordeaux.
Morgan Harris
Morgan Harris
The Hewitson wines, while remarkable for their location and vine age, are really pretty candied though...I went to a big tasting a while ago in NYC and was pretty against them for my own taste. Like many wines, an excellent example of what they were trying to accomplish, but not wine that I want to be drinking (with any regularity, at least).
Morgan Harris
Morgan Harris
I do have to add that the pictures of these untrained 160-year-old Mataro vines are pretty amazing though, if anyone can turn them up.
Eden Mylunsch
Eden Mylunsch
Once more, and without resorting to ALL CAPS, illegal emoticons, or words perceived as being of a profane nature (although the concept might fall under that heading); if I may reiterate again, candy-be-damned, these Oz wines may be "just okay" (albeit oft mono-dimensional) on release but rarely become compelling to drink until they've got 8-10 years of age on them.
Think of them as you would Chinon or above-average-IQ high school cheerleaders. In their formative years, they're easy game for pointy-headed intellectual naysayers who seem to make sport of judging something that may well be callow in its youth (wayward or otherwise) and then continue as vehement haterz, predisposed against them forevermore and for all time and rarely deigning to revisit them once they've evolved to a state more demonstrative of their heritage and environment.
I mean, it's easy here at Wine Disorder to to march in lockstep to the ideology of "if it's in Wine Spectator, the wine's already jumped the shark" and hew to the traditionalist, protectionist, jingoistic and fundamentalist POVs in our devotion to old world wines over new world wines. That's okay, but maybe it's just me, but it seems that slavishly adhering to any wine ideology fucks up stuff because signing on to support a particular POV puts us in a defensive position and invariably prevents one from rethinking (and possibly challenging) your previous stance. As David Mamet once put it, "things change" (I love Ricky Jay's work). Sometimes they get better and the wines grow more interesting, they compel and implore pleasure over time. Sure, sometimes they devolve into a murky, syrupy mess destined for the wine list at IHOP, or maybe they turn into a fruitless, acidic olive-pit of a wine, inspiring descriptors along the lines of "this reminds me of what the atmosphere of Pluto would be like if it had an atmosphere" or " quick, someone call the CDC to destroy this before we all die!" Personally, I don't believe that I'm ever going to love many (if any) of the 2003 Ch“teauneuf-du-Papes, but you never know so I haven't gotten rid of all of them yet. By the same token, I'm ever hopeful that my bottles of 2004 Bellivière Le Rouge-Gorge are going to be drinkable for more than intellectual purposes, but I fear that I may be waiting longer for that blessed moment to occur than I will for my Barossa Mourvèdres (at least most of the 04 Bellivières I've opened have been corked, so I haven't had to have been an apologist for the wine itself and I'm given the opportunity to rant to my students against the use of cork as a closure)(we all need closure of some kind, don't we?)
Whether something is done in a style you like is another question. Jesus coming back to earth would be impressive to Christians (Jews too, in all likelihood) but while followers of Haitian Vodou might possibly enjoy the pentacostal fire-in-the-sky pageantry inherent in such an event, they would probably interpret it differently (and that's not even touching on how it would affect Raelists, Scientologists, Universe People, and Star Trekkers and them that are following "normal" religions in the Middle East, India, Canada, etc).
I'm not advocating that we all go out and buy scads of Harlan Estate or Spanish glop made by flying Aussie winemakers just to see how they'll develop. I'm merely suggesting that we not pro-forma condemn all wines from a appellation (or even a producer) just because we had one untoward experience with them when they weren't ready for prime time and we didn't know that they even could evolve into something more pleasurable. After all, just think what it would be like if we stuck to that approach after the first time we got laid?
-Eden (excuse me, but I'm late for my Nuwabian Sunday School class)
Think of them as you would Chinon or above-average-IQ high school cheerleaders. In their formative years, they're easy game for pointy-headed intellectual naysayers who seem to make sport of judging something that may well be callow in its youth (wayward or otherwise) and then continue as vehement haterz, predisposed against them forevermore and for all time and rarely deigning to revisit them once they've evolved to a state more demonstrative of their heritage and environment.
I mean, it's easy here at Wine Disorder to to march in lockstep to the ideology of "if it's in Wine Spectator, the wine's already jumped the shark" and hew to the traditionalist, protectionist, jingoistic and fundamentalist POVs in our devotion to old world wines over new world wines. That's okay, but maybe it's just me, but it seems that slavishly adhering to any wine ideology fucks up stuff because signing on to support a particular POV puts us in a defensive position and invariably prevents one from rethinking (and possibly challenging) your previous stance. As David Mamet once put it, "things change" (I love Ricky Jay's work). Sometimes they get better and the wines grow more interesting, they compel and implore pleasure over time. Sure, sometimes they devolve into a murky, syrupy mess destined for the wine list at IHOP, or maybe they turn into a fruitless, acidic olive-pit of a wine, inspiring descriptors along the lines of "this reminds me of what the atmosphere of Pluto would be like if it had an atmosphere" or " quick, someone call the CDC to destroy this before we all die!" Personally, I don't believe that I'm ever going to love many (if any) of the 2003 Ch“teauneuf-du-Papes, but you never know so I haven't gotten rid of all of them yet. By the same token, I'm ever hopeful that my bottles of 2004 Bellivière Le Rouge-Gorge are going to be drinkable for more than intellectual purposes, but I fear that I may be waiting longer for that blessed moment to occur than I will for my Barossa Mourvèdres (at least most of the 04 Bellivières I've opened have been corked, so I haven't had to have been an apologist for the wine itself and I'm given the opportunity to rant to my students against the use of cork as a closure)(we all need closure of some kind, don't we?)
Whether something is done in a style you like is another question. Jesus coming back to earth would be impressive to Christians (Jews too, in all likelihood) but while followers of Haitian Vodou might possibly enjoy the pentacostal fire-in-the-sky pageantry inherent in such an event, they would probably interpret it differently (and that's not even touching on how it would affect Raelists, Scientologists, Universe People, and Star Trekkers and them that are following "normal" religions in the Middle East, India, Canada, etc).
I'm not advocating that we all go out and buy scads of Harlan Estate or Spanish glop made by flying Aussie winemakers just to see how they'll develop. I'm merely suggesting that we not pro-forma condemn all wines from a appellation (or even a producer) just because we had one untoward experience with them when they weren't ready for prime time and we didn't know that they even could evolve into something more pleasurable. After all, just think what it would be like if we stuck to that approach after the first time we got laid?
-Eden (excuse me, but I'm late for my Nuwabian Sunday School class)
Bill Lundstrom
Bill Lundstrom
eden,you just made my day. thank you. and i have a had particularly bad week. stranded in airports up and down the east coast during a week of business travel.
the icing on the cake was waking up this morning to head up to my favorite farmers market in philly only to find my tires slashed. awesome!
again thank you eden. i am smiling for the first time in week.
the icing on the cake was waking up this morning to head up to my favorite farmers market in philly only to find my tires slashed. awesome!
again thank you eden. i am smiling for the first time in week.
Levi Dalton
Levi Dalton
I have never enjoyed a Hewitson wine. I really don't know if they were featured in The Wine Spectator or not. I hope that it is okay that I do not happen to like them.
Morgan Harris
Morgan Harris
Eden Mylunsch
Eden Mylunsch
No problem Levi - we can all like or dislike anything we want and your opinion in particular is one that I pay attention to (it's not as if Asimov is calling me to sit on his tasting panel).
We're just talking about wine here, so it's not like politics where everyone suffers when there's no compromise between two groups of people with conflicting/contrasting views. My frustration (and resulting bloviation) is that a "my way or the highway" board approach is going to put the kibosh on non-approved wines or winemaking styles (unless the politburo is making these distinctions, in which case I'm fine with whatever edict they hand down, seeing as how they're writing the checks)(and maybe I'm just a figment of their imagination anyway, yet another fictional troll character from the Mind of Coad).
As for me, maybe 70% of the wine I drink for enjoyment is old world juice, and most of those are wines that have achieved critical mass in popularity and awareness through the efforts of Wine Disorder. CSW is on speed dial, and Lou Amdur follows me on twitter. I'm more likely to buy on a Levi Dalton or Jim Cowan recommendation that I am based on one from James Suckling or Robert Parker but I'm kind of locavorish like that, given Wine Disorder is my locale of choice. However, I don't automatically dislike the Suckling or Parker recommendations; I wait until I've tasted the wine myself to pronounce it yucky and pine for the good ol' days, pre global warming and global wine internationalization.
Let a gazillion flowers bloom, at least until hay fever season.
-Eden (not trolling, and I've no bones to pick with anyone, just opining on a Sunday morning)
We're just talking about wine here, so it's not like politics where everyone suffers when there's no compromise between two groups of people with conflicting/contrasting views. My frustration (and resulting bloviation) is that a "my way or the highway" board approach is going to put the kibosh on non-approved wines or winemaking styles (unless the politburo is making these distinctions, in which case I'm fine with whatever edict they hand down, seeing as how they're writing the checks)(and maybe I'm just a figment of their imagination anyway, yet another fictional troll character from the Mind of Coad).
As for me, maybe 70% of the wine I drink for enjoyment is old world juice, and most of those are wines that have achieved critical mass in popularity and awareness through the efforts of Wine Disorder. CSW is on speed dial, and Lou Amdur follows me on twitter. I'm more likely to buy on a Levi Dalton or Jim Cowan recommendation that I am based on one from James Suckling or Robert Parker but I'm kind of locavorish like that, given Wine Disorder is my locale of choice. However, I don't automatically dislike the Suckling or Parker recommendations; I wait until I've tasted the wine myself to pronounce it yucky and pine for the good ol' days, pre global warming and global wine internationalization.
Let a gazillion flowers bloom, at least until hay fever season.
-Eden (not trolling, and I've no bones to pick with anyone, just opining on a Sunday morning)
Jonathan Loesberg
Jonathan Loesberg
While not conceptually impossible, I expect for various surrounding social reasons, as it was in my day, so it is now: intellectual cheerleader is an oxymoron.
Oswaldo Costa
Oswaldo Costa
2009 Telmo Rodriguez A1 Muvedre Tinto Joven Alicante DOC 13.5%
Saw this at the supermarket and was tempted because of this thread, the low price, and recent comments from Victor about Telmo's increasing devotion to the righteous path. This would be a $10 wine in the US, so expectations were modest. My two scents were graphite and olives, over a background that I took to be virtual blackberries, virtual because I didn't experience them directly, only though their effect on the orbit
Saw this at the supermarket and was tempted because of this thread, the low price, and recent comments from Victor about Telmo's increasing devotion to the righteous path. This would be a $10 wine in the US, so expectations were modest. My two scents were graphite and olives, over a background that I took to be virtual blackberries, virtual because I didn't experience them directly, only though their effect on the orbit
Jeff Grossman
Jeff Grossman
I can't tell... did you like the wine or not?
Oswaldo Costa
Oswaldo Costa
Strange, the rest of the note didn't show. Will try to reconstitute.
Oswaldo Costa
Oswaldo Costa
2009 Telmo Rodriguez A1 Muvedre Tinto Joven Alicante DOC 13.5%
Saw this at the supermarket and was tempted because of this thread, the low price, and recent comments from Victor about Telmo's increasing devotion to the righteous path. This would be a $10 wine in the US, so expectations were modest. My two scents were graphite and olives, over a background that I took to be virtual blackberries, virtual because I didn't experience them directly, only though their effect on the orbit of the surrounding bodies. Light and pleasing tannins, with well calibrated acidity that felt distinct from the rest. There were shortcomings (and goings) in the mid palate and the finish suffered from fatigue and shortness of breadth. The sweetness had a touch of molasses but no jam, gracias a dios, though there was a smidgen of heat.
The gestalt was not as dismal as I may be suggesting, though there will be no repeat purchases, even at the leniency-inducing price. Mourvèdre likes to see the sea, and Alicante is coastal, so I wonder why this isn't better. There are several reasons, none of which is known to me. But they are there. I feel their pull.
Saw this at the supermarket and was tempted because of this thread, the low price, and recent comments from Victor about Telmo's increasing devotion to the righteous path. This would be a $10 wine in the US, so expectations were modest. My two scents were graphite and olives, over a background that I took to be virtual blackberries, virtual because I didn't experience them directly, only though their effect on the orbit of the surrounding bodies. Light and pleasing tannins, with well calibrated acidity that felt distinct from the rest. There were shortcomings (and goings) in the mid palate and the finish suffered from fatigue and shortness of breadth. The sweetness had a touch of molasses but no jam, gracias a dios, though there was a smidgen of heat.
The gestalt was not as dismal as I may be suggesting, though there will be no repeat purchases, even at the leniency-inducing price. Mourvèdre likes to see the sea, and Alicante is coastal, so I wonder why this isn't better. There are several reasons, none of which is known to me. But they are there. I feel their pull.
Al Muvedre is a rock-bottom, 4-euro wine in Spain, so the lengthy tasting notes aren't really justified IMHO, Oswaldo.
Mourvèdre, monastrell, is originally a Spanish grape variety, and, thank goodness, none of it sees the sea when grown in its birthplace - it would be irremediably jammy and flat at sea level in these latitudes. It's grown on the southeastern high plateau, altitudes 500 to 900 meters.
The choice of Spanish wines in this tasting was not too inspired, I'm afraid. Casa Castillo, Enrique Mendoza's Estrecho, Rafael Cambra, Beryna, Sierra Salinas, Heretat de Cesilia, would have been much better in this context.
Mourvèdre, monastrell, is originally a Spanish grape variety, and, thank goodness, none of it sees the sea when grown in its birthplace - it would be irremediably jammy and flat at sea level in these latitudes. It's grown on the southeastern high plateau, altitudes 500 to 900 meters.
The choice of Spanish wines in this tasting was not too inspired, I'm afraid. Casa Castillo, Enrique Mendoza's Estrecho, Rafael Cambra, Beryna, Sierra Salinas, Heretat de Cesilia, would have been much better in this context.
Oswaldo Costa
Oswaldo Costa
Understood, though I'd find it dismal if the length of a tasting note were correlated to price (I know you're not really suggesting it should be). I've also found satisfying mourvedres made away from the sea to be as scarce as satisfying wines made above 500 meters. If the ones you mention are examples of both, that's eye opening.
Oswaldo Costa
Oswaldo Costa
I truly loved the Catalan wines at the Chambers tasting; are Els Jelipins, Mendall, San Feliu, etc., higher than 500m? Are the vineyards that make the lovely old Riojas higher than 500m? If so, I would be instantly stood corrected.