Some recent highlights:
04 Agrapart Mineral was all sorts of awesome. Moderately rich style. Very stoney, very penetrating. Not fruit driven, more terroir and a bit of biscuit and yeast driven. Good concentration and a lot of power and a long finish. A bit stylized but very very good. More in the vein of a Vilmart / Bouchard. For my tastes, about as good as $50 Champagne gets.
1991 Mt Eden Chardonnay was excellent. Beautiful, integrated, effortless wine. Concentrated with rainwater, hints of lemon, toasted nuts, wet rock and some waxy characters. Probably won't improve and offers a lot of joy now.
06 A Conterno Romirasco was everything you could ask for in Barolo and one of the single best young nebbiolo wines I've had. Tremendous power, tremendous complexity but lithe and focused and detailed with great clarity.
06 Nicolas Potel Clos Saint Denis was similarly awesome but in a more enchanting and less powerful way. Tremendously spicy and floral and stoney, very pure pretty fruit, and thankfully no brett.
99 Billecart BdB GC was tremendous. I really like this wine and this is another winner. While I drink and love a lot of grower champagne, this is also a great bottle. Sparked a discussion of whether this or the 06 Haut L'emblee was better... the discussion still is unsettled.
There have been other good to great bottles lately - 01 CFE, 10 Pepiere Briords, 00 Conterno Colonello, 04 Cavallotto Vignolo were all excellent as well, but the above have really stood out.
And then one of the worst wines I've ever had. Clearly just a closed wine, and a bad bottle of it to boot, and something that no one who tasted it understood:
09 Ganevat l'enfant terrible was terrible indeed. Quite reduced on opening, tremendously bretty, going off in bottle with prominent carbonation, tasted of bretty cherry cola with a pickle garnish. This was really a trainwreck...
04 Agrapart Mineral was all sorts of awesome. Moderately rich style. Very stoney, very penetrating. Not fruit driven, more terroir and a bit of biscuit and yeast driven. Good concentration and a lot of power and a long finish. A bit stylized but very very good. More in the vein of a Vilmart / Bouchard. For my tastes, about as good as $50 Champagne gets.
1991 Mt Eden Chardonnay was excellent. Beautiful, integrated, effortless wine. Concentrated with rainwater, hints of lemon, toasted nuts, wet rock and some waxy characters. Probably won't improve and offers a lot of joy now.
06 A Conterno Romirasco was everything you could ask for in Barolo and one of the single best young nebbiolo wines I've had. Tremendous power, tremendous complexity but lithe and focused and detailed with great clarity.
06 Nicolas Potel Clos Saint Denis was similarly awesome but in a more enchanting and less powerful way. Tremendously spicy and floral and stoney, very pure pretty fruit, and thankfully no brett.
99 Billecart BdB GC was tremendous. I really like this wine and this is another winner. While I drink and love a lot of grower champagne, this is also a great bottle. Sparked a discussion of whether this or the 06 Haut L'emblee was better... the discussion still is unsettled.
There have been other good to great bottles lately - 01 CFE, 10 Pepiere Briords, 00 Conterno Colonello, 04 Cavallotto Vignolo were all excellent as well, but the above have really stood out.
And then one of the worst wines I've ever had. Clearly just a closed wine, and a bad bottle of it to boot, and something that no one who tasted it understood:
09 Ganevat l'enfant terrible was terrible indeed. Quite reduced on opening, tremendously bretty, going off in bottle with prominent carbonation, tasted of bretty cherry cola with a pickle garnish. This was really a trainwreck...