Generally our little wine groups tasting days are about finding value. A usual favourite is pitting the icons up against wines half the price and hoping to make a discovery. Generally the icons win out, a lot more than you’d think, but every now and then you discover something and load up. One of the most enjoyable & satisfying parts of learning about wine is about finding value: anyone can go and get a great bottle armed with a couple of pineapples but if you know what you’re doing you can drink better for less. It’s all part of the fun.
Some days though, it’s just about pure indulgence & when a friend had a bottle of 2008 Grange gifted to him that he offered to share, unsurprisingly he had plenty of takers. Collectively we managed to make a day of it to send off 2021. Wine organisation was a bit haphazard but came together, 20 minutes in the fridge for most bottles worked wonders. The food was sensational – a credit to our hosts and their helpers. The centerpiece of the afternoon, Grange, is a wine plenty of people have opinions on, whether they’ve tasted it or not. “Overpriced / overrated” is the myopic and oh so predictable one you’re likely to hear. It’s not a wine I lust over but its reputation did not come out of thin air. My take on it is this: why wouldn’t you just enjoy it for what it is?
(Whites)
Giaconda Chardonnay (I brought this). Impressively rich, this is massive wine, perfectly pitched & packed choc-a-bloc with flavour. Giaconda is, (like Grange perhaps), a wine to tick off the bucket list as it is at the extreme end of the scale. Good in this kind of situation, but I was left pondering if I could manage a whole bottle between 2 or 3 people. I think others might have liked it a tiny bit more than me. This is serious stuff.
Tarrawarra Reserve Chardonnay 2017. This was hard to get a read on as the Chardonnays came out in the wrong order (my fault). More scaled back and restrained, this may have been a really good wine, it was certainly sound, but was just dwarfed by the dimensions of the Giaconda. Nice to drink some Vic Chardy given how much WA gear we put away.
LAS Vino ‘Chenin Blanc Dynamic Blend’ 2020. Not the kind of wine I’d usually seek out so it was good to taste something a bit different. The wine had nice aromatics, tasted like a varietal Chenin & improved with time in the glass. I initially thought the acidity was a bit low, but it was suggested to me that it was indeed there & skillfully integrated rather than sharp and overpowering. A good wine that may have showed its full wares if matched to a specific dish.
(Reds with lunch)
Penfolds Grange 2008. We gave this some time in the fridge to get it to a suitable serving temperature & then decanted for half an hour or so. For what its worth, I tasted this not long after release & loved it – I was so impressed by it’s size and length. A decade or so on from that it has developed into a beautiful wine, certainly nothing over the top. The length is still there, the fruit an essay in harmonious South Australian Shiraz. It’s easy to say ‘better in another decade or so’ but I loved the place it was in now. Good to see it deliver, this is an ‘asterisk in for the vowels’ type wine (f**k yeah) and clearly wine of the day.
Henschke ‘Cyril Henschke’ Cabernet Sauvignon 1993. A successful attempt at getting out a very old cork and presenting the wine without sediment. This was an interesting counterpoint to the Grange and I was able to enjoy the two side by side. An ‘old money’ wine, soft and delicate to taste, but it also had a bit of richness to the nose. Flavours not yet leaning towards soy so I deduced it’s not yet falling over, though perhaps still a bit old for my tastes. This was nevertheless as good a showing as one could expect & consensus was, I think, that we enjoyed this wine a lot and found it very interesting.
Clonakilla Shiraz Viognier 2019. I also brought this (bias declared) and thought it mixed it comfortably with todays big guns. Open for business, tending towards medium bodied with a good mix of red fruits and seductive cool climate flavours. More than anything, it just tastes like Clonakilla. Happy to have a few of these left.
(Reds post lunch)
Pierro Cabernet Sauvignon Reserve 2013. An interesting combination of one of my least favourite red wine producers in MR, and also one of my least favourite vintages of recent times. I’d be interested in others opinions on this (the wine talk had well and truly subsided), but this was for me the disappointment of the day. Under-ripe capsicum / pyrazine type flavours to me suggested another step in the wrong direction from the herbal / eucalpyt you can sometimes see in MR when picked just a fraction early. I tried to go in with an open mind but genuinely struggled with this.
Felton Road ‘Calvert’ Pinot Noir 2020. Much like the Grange, this tasted exactly as I expected it to. A massive, exaggerated Pinot tending towards Shiraz-like, with a bit of ‘sore thumb’ oak sticking out at the end. This is not a producer or style I lust after, though I did expect others to love it. On the day I think it was liked rather than loved. 5 – 10 years off drinking well, and that perhaps is worth keeping in mind.
Devils Lair Cabernet Sauvignon 2018. A wine we as a group have collectively loaded up on, this is a 750ml bottle of grape juice that we can track the development of as a team. While it presented pretty well it’s not at it’s most enjoyable just yet, certainly not without a lot more air than we gave it. The tannins, though a bit obtrusive on the day, will see this through to a long drinking window.
(Reds when we should have been drinking water)
Lenton Brae ‘Wilyabrup’ Cabernet Sauvignon 2019. I preferred this to the Devils Lair, which at more than double the price you should I guess. Nevertheless, even with a bit of palate fatigue I thought this was very attractive & wouldn’t hesitate to crack one at the moment and bask in that lovely cabernet fruit. The top end 19’s might be better than I am expecting.
Penfolds St Henri shiraz 2016. I can’t remember too much about this except that it was really good & had a bit more body than I expected from a St Henri. I actually really enjoyed the South Australian/Penfolds stuff today because it’s just not something I drink that often.
Predictably i stayed too late, but also had a really enjoyable wander home. Happy NY.
The Wine Accomplice 