Browse Tag

red

Rives gauches

Val d’Orbieu “Les Deux Rives” 1999 Corbières (Languedoc) – Stewed and horrid. Possibly heat-damaged, but that’s far from all that’s wrong here. (8/07)

The little mermaid

Barruol “Oriel” 2003 Côtes-du-Rhône (Rhône) – Simplistic and far too gentle for its own good; there’s garrigue and bubblegum, herb and earth, but mostly there’s a lack of intensity. It improves a bit with air, but not enough to be more than pleasantly innocuous. (9/07)

Cosme-over

Barruol “Château de Saint Cosme” 1995 Gigondas “Valbelle” (Rhône) – Heavy, sludgy raspberry with dense mocha oak, which eventually overwhelms even the intense fruit and leaves the wine somewhat void of character despite all its intense volume. It might improve with more aging, but at this point I doubt that the fruit will ever outlive the wood. (7/07)

Some people call me Maurice

[grapes]Clos du Paradis “Domaine Viret” 1999 Côtes-du-Rhône-Villages Saint-Maurice “Cosmic” (Rhône) – This may be the best bottle I’ve had, but it’s also the last. Oh well. Perfectly-integrated and developed earth, spice and old, animal-brushed fruit baked by sun and dried by wind, with a long, utterly pleasant finish. Terrific. (7/07)

Côtes du Ventoux and Tyler, too

[vineyard]Brusset 2005 Côtes du Ventoux (Rhône) – A fine New World syrah, with big, dark, moody black and purple fruit so dense and thick one needs a scythe to cut through its density. It feels like it should be oaky, but I don’t think it is. Though at this point, it could hardly hurt. (7/07)

Matthew, Mark, Luke…

[steve & grapes]Edmunds St. John 1995 Syrah Durell (Sonoma Valley) – Very primary and mostly monolithic, despite some hints of darkly brooding earth and slowly-developing roasted fruit. There’s still a load of tannin as well, and while the quality of this wine is obvious, it’s nowhere near being ready to drink, much less anything even vaguely approximating maturity. Do it (and yourself) a favor and put it back to bed before it hurts somebody. (8/07)

Flaviens Flav

[logo]Kreydenweiss 2001 Vin de Pays des Coteaux Flaviens “Ansata” (Rhône) – Here I pay the price for a lack of confidence, figuring that an Alsatian winemaker won’t necessarily know how to make an ageable Rhône without a lot of practice. Oh, me of little hope. While this is definitely showing some signs of positive development, there’s no hurry to open it. The fruit has smoothed to a Southern Rhônish sheen of herbed strawberry, underbrush, slick leather and hints of bubblegum, but there’s a moderate amount of structure still to resolve (and the acid-averse will probably find more than they’d like here; I think it’s a terrific element that’s too often missing in these wines), and the finish is long and only hints and teases at full tertiary complexity. A fine effort, and a lot of fun at blind tastings (“it’s a red from Marc Kreydenweiss, and it’s not pinot noir…”). (8/07)

Sur le pont

Terres d’Avignon (Kermit Lynch) 2005 Côtes-du-Rhône (Rhône) – Bigger, but not denser, than the 2004, with more structure (no surprise) and a darker, dirtier turn to the fruit. It’s kinda rough going right now, but I suspect a few years’ aging will sort things out in a positive direction. (8/07)

Grist for the mill

[label]Bradford Mountain 2002 Syrah Grist (Dry Creek Valley) – 15.5%. Unmistakably syrah, and just as unmistakably Californian, with thick blueberry dominating a breath of leather and velvety tannin. If there’s oak here (and there probably is), the fruit’s soaked it all up, but the alcohol does remain a bit prickly. A lush, full-bodied but structured wine with aging potential…though watch that heat. (8/07)