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sipp mack

The knife

Sipp Mack 2002 Riesling “Vieilles Vignes” (Alsace) – Not the most vibrant bottle, whether closed or muted. Salty – very salty – and wet, like soaked feet after traipsing through the grass. Some dry-as-a-bone raw iron, but solid rather than flecked and suffusing. I’ve had better examples of this of late. (2/11)

The knife

Sipp Mack 2007 Riesling “Vieilles Vignes” (Alsace) – Juicy. There’s a certain softness to this bottling that carries though vintages, but the modulating acidity is almost always just enough to keep it fresh. This is young enough that its minerality, bare-boned and stark, still lies beneath primary layers of ground cover. Give it some time in the cellar; a few years, maybe. (9/10)

One Sipp at a time

Sipp Mack 2004 Riesling “Vieilles Vignes” (Alsace) – Soft minerality, just barely enough acidity to compensate, and a wide, planar texture. Quite fair. (9/10)

Mack truck

Sipp Mack 2005 Pinot Blanc (Alsace) – Bigger than expected, and comes galloping out of the gate with an insistent simplicity: pear, apple, paper. Doesn’t really go anywhere, though. Party wine. (2/10)

Alex

[vine]Sipp Mack 2004 Gewurztraminer “Tradition” (Alsace) – Soft and pretty. A rose-scented expression of gewurztraminer’s feminine side. It’s still flavorful, but undemanding, and everything in support of those roses is B-plot, not the main narrative. (1/10)

One Sipp at a time

[vineyard]Sipp Mack 2002 Riesling “Vieilles Vignes” (Alsace) – Reticent and already fading a bit into its brown stage…but not (for the worrywarts) oxidized, just old. Broad minerality and past-prime apple, white pepper, some glassed-in lemon rind, but not a lot of any of these things. Drink up. (12/09)

Sipp Mack 2004 Riesling “Vieilles Vignes” (Alsace) – Softened and oddly herbal, yet there’s a ramrod of rieslingish rigidity driven straight through the spine, and a lot of slowly-flaking mineral salts to deal with on the finish. Weird but good. (12/09)

Another Sipp

[vines]Sipp Mack 2004 Gewurztraminer “Vendanges Tardives” “Lucie Marie” (Alsace) – Lighter-styled, showing rose oil, cashew juice, and ripe peach. Moderately sweet, elegant, and smooth, this is the perfect style of VT to have (as the Alsatians do) pre-dinner, with foie gras, rather than afterwards as a decadent dessert. (3/06)