What did you drink tonight?

OMG; hard to think of what more one would want in a young Saar riesling. enough acidity to make your ears ring, but intertwined with the most delicately ripe fruit: yellow cherry and bartlett pears and some zingy citrusy zest. just amazing length and balance. OMFG.
 
2007 Ganevat Cuvée de Garde, chardonnay and savagnin from old vines, half and half, aged under chador for two years in barriques. Mr. Sotolon (I presume) runs roughshod over peekaboo traces of wheat germ, hay and graphite. Beautiful mouthweight, excellent balance. Too bad I am not crazy about Mr. Sotolon. The lawd knows, I've tried to reprogram my brain, but I just don't respond well to veiled treats. More for others.

2011 Ganevat Cuvée de L’Enfant Terrible, 11%-worth of Poulsard goodness from blue and grey marl. Awesome color of pomegranate juice. Raspberries, spices, caramel, light barnyard. CO2 bubbliness. Luminous fruit, perfect EQ. Memorable.
 
Last night a solitary bottle of 1995 Drouhin Clos de Vougeot seemed wizened, somewhat the worse for wear, leaving us drinkers none the wiser. Like an old timer who doesn't exercise, it doddered across the finish line, more balsam than balm. Perhaps disappointment was all the stars had ever planned, since Drouhin's plot sits smack on the N74.
 
originally posted by Oswaldo Costa:
Last night a solitary bottle of 1995 Drouhin Clos de Vougeot seemed wizened, somewhat the worse for wear, leaving us drinkers none the wiser. Like an old timer who doesn't exercise, it doddered across the finish line, more balsam than balm. Perhaps disappointment was all the stars had ever planned, since Drouhin's plot sits smack on the N74.
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in a bored spirit of channeling yixin, why blame drouhin for a child someone else abused?

the nicest and most surprising wine in the trough at tonight's fatfest was an 86 village fixin from berthaut. again, somehow appropriately channeling yixin, it had lain most of its life underground, in belgium.

from a shelf in hoboken, ymmv.

shit is hard, i know, but you has to channel teh feelings to beat teh trollz.

obkfb.
 
A year ago a 1998 Hermann Dönnhoff Norheimer Kirschheck Riesling Spätlese was amazingly graceful and poised. Last night a 1999 Dönnhoff Oberhäuser Brücke Riesling Spätlese, with the same bottle age, was baroque but too sweet. Don't know if it was vintage or vineyard, but only one burgher could dance.
 
2004 Paul Bara Bouzy Rouge Coteaux de Champenois may be a one chord samba, but it's a beautifully contoured sinusoidal array, the envelope softened by valve amp distortion. Fiercely acidic before food, as CCs are wont to be, yet roundly harmonic afterwards. A simple rendition, yet physiologically ideal for me.
 
That Berthaut probably had a fair whack of cane sugar. Just to extend the fermentation, of course.

Laherte Frères has a Coteaux Champenois (2012 vintage). Come get your allocation in Singapore.

Heat-damaged 2010 Brégeon tonight. What a waste, that was one of the most stunning wines from that vintage (and watch for the late release white label).
 
originally posted by Yixin:
That Berthaut probably had a fair whack of cane sugar. Just to extend the fermentation, of course.
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you'd think so, it's true. but i doubt it. too much translucency of color, and too much delicacy of texture; and when i've left bottles open, it improves for days. none of these are things i associate with heavy handed sugar use. my guess would be half a degree or so at most.

more likely it is that being so far north, they missed the heavy rains and the rot that plagued more southerly villages in 86, and weren't so minded to pull the trigger early like most others did (indeed, in fixin and marsannay in those days, it may not even have been an option). then given that the weather turned to good as the harvest began, and stayed that way for a while, it may be that they were simply fortunate enough to be able to make good wine. (this, of course, being why we love vintage generalizations so much.)

still, who can resist the idea of fixin for yixin? i'll hide one in teh fatcave, in case you are ever in swabia.

fb.
 
originally posted by Oswaldo Costa:
2004 Paul Bara Bouzy Rouge Coteaux de Champenois may be a one chord samba, but it's a beautifully contoured sinusoidal array, the envelope softened by valve amp distortion. Fiercely acidic before food, as CCs are wont to be, yet roundly harmonic afterwards. A simple rendition, yet physiologically ideal for me.
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funny. i've been working my way though a stash of eighties bouzys over the past few months. in a slightly obsessive way. chamber wines is how i've been putting it, but one chord samba works.

that acidity seems to bestow teh cloak of immortality on well stored shit.

fb.
 
originally posted by fatboy:
too much translucency of color
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Seems logical that added sugar, resulting in higher alcohol, would increase color extraction, but I've been having a discussion with a local winemaker who assures me that almost all color extraction (unlike tannin extraction) happens in the very earliest days of fermentation, so that sugar additions would not result in a darker liquid. I was hoping that darker Burgs would, other things equal, be more likely to have been chaptalized than lighter ones, but he assures me that there's no way that could be true.

Anyone have hard evidence to the contrary?
 
2009 Arnot-Roberts North Coast Syrah started out quite blackberryish, with lots of pencil lead and mineral smells to it, but gradually morphed into much more savory territory over the course of a dinner of grilled venison chops. As I sit and contemplate the last of it now, the fruit has almost totally receded and a saline, proto-meaty Syrah has replaced it. I can see this turning into something quite remarkable in another 3-5 years, but alas it is my last bottle. Fortunately, I have a couple of bottles of the '08 Hudson Syrah to essay my strategy with.

Mark Lipton
 
Two very restrained wines:

2011 Reverdy, Sancerre Rouge is quite stern on day one but loosens a little bit after 24 hours. Some lactic softness over crunchy red fruit, lightweight and dense at the same time. Persistent mineral backbone. Very alive. What a treat.

2004 Chateau d'Epire, Savennieres regular bottling. Tight, possibly tannic. Honey, lemon and wet stones. Pretty and precise but this bottle is still closed up. Shines brightest with food but not for sipping. Not yet. 3 quartz prongs on the bank of a river in summertime.
 
1998 Angerville Volnay was a bit tannic (stems?) and astringent last night. Food softened it, but it still came off as brawny and built to be a premier cru. Mercifully without salient alcohol or wood, but there wasn't much pleasure to be had. As befits an aristocrat's wine, no sediment at all, unlike a 98 Chamonard Morgon Clos de Lys the night before, that had tons, as befits a farmer's wine.
 
originally posted by Sharon Bowman:
Is that how you tell?
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Isn't it obvious? Farmers have dirt under their nails and that inevitably finds its way into the bottles. Aristocrats go for manipedis and can afford to be anal, so they filter everything.
 
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