Browse Tag

alsace

Beblen brook

[vineyard]Deiss 1997 Pinot Gris Beblenheim (Alsace) – For a 1997, this has a surprising amount of balancing acidity, though it’s still not enough to support the metallic pear soup weight of the wine. Still, crystalline minerality is also in play, as are mineral salts and a cured woodfruit finish, and this is not at all bad in a year from which I like very little of Deiss’ work. (1/10)

Sparring partner

Sparr 2004 “One” (Alsace) – This was too long to hold what is a fun, blended wine, because it’s getting watery at both the core and the fringes, but what’s left is still an easy-drinking, anonymous-grape quaffer. (1/10)

Slender

Trimbach 2006 Pinot Blanc (Alsace) – These wines, fairly basic in their normal state, are best in years when either their minerality or their spice are allowed to shine, which I presume corresponds fairly directly to the length and heat of the season, respectively. This is one of the latter: stone fruit, as much crisp as ripe, with pretty baking spices. There’s a little bit of minerality, as well. One of the better examples amongst recent vintages. (1/10)

CFEVT812

Trimbach 2000 Riesling “Cuvée Frédéric Émile Vendanges Tardives” (Alsace) – Impossibly tight and unyielding to any amount of air, swirling, or overnight oxidation. It just sits there, closed-in about itself, wondering why you were crazy enough to open it now. I wouldn’t even think of touching this for another ten years, if this is the stage it’s currently in. (1/10)

Fonné girl

Michel Fonné Crémant d’Alsace (Alsace) – Surprisingly complete, with chalky yeastiness and the beginnings of identifiable autolysis, a very rindy citrus palate, and a crisp and expansive froth. Salty. The intense finish sharpens to a point. This is already better than most Alsatian crémant, though a little more aromatic generosity would not hurt. (1/10)

Boxtail soup

Boxler 2004 Riesling “Réserve” (Alsace) – A Chadderdon bottling, and thus (as is the case with some of them) without a label code indicating specific origin or vine age details. As Boxler rieslings go, this is one of the weaker ones…which means it’s still quite tasty, but that it lacks the rich complexity of the domaine’s more interesting terroirs. Ripe apple, ripe lime, transparent aluminum, hints of sweetness, and fair acidity. That’s about it. (1/10)

Alten brown

Blanck 2002 Gewurztraminer Altenbourg (Alsace) – After a few tightly-closed explorations, my last bottle of this (I have a fair quantity) was blossoming, so hopes were high. Apparently, the debutante ball was premature, because this is a self-absorbed teenager wrapped up in a hormonal stew of semi-imaginary problems at the moment. There’s some strappy pork jerky, perhaps, and some sticky lacings of something in the tropical family of fruits that services gewurztraminer, but otherwise this is still closed for any sort of adult business. (1/10)

CPE

Trimbach 2000 Riesling (Alsace) – Age hasn’t hurt this, but it has certainly transformed it from puppy-fat youth to skeletal oldster in just a few years. Not that the négociant wines of Trimbach are really meant to age, but the rieslings can be surprising; the ’98 did particularly well up to about its tenth birthday or so. Anyway, here we’ve got stalky steel flaking away into a brisk fall breeze, a hazy memory of apple, and…well, that’s pretty much it. Drink up, for sure, but with a certain austere pleasure. (12/09)