Month: December 2024

2021 Envínate Vinos Atlanticos Táganan

Another of the swaps for some of the annual Wendouree order and another from the Canary Islands, yet another one of Spain’s rediscovered wonders. From the north east tip of Tenerife and pre phylloxera vines including a field blend of obscure varieties as well as the principal Lístan Negro, this is extraordinary. It took nearly three days for a compelling tale to unfold. An oceanic fog of flints banged hard, that seems typical of old volcanic soils, clears to smells of fresh berries and spice. So pure and evenly spread with depth and breadth, the wave breaks on rocks that dry and refresh as the tide sucks. These are simply the best flavoured and balanced grapes turned into liquid. Individual descriptions of flavours seem redundant. How an island so close to the Sahara can produce wine that’s about as thrilling and satisfying as anything I’ve been lucky enough to drink from the established greats of France or Italy is boggling. Long threads of perfect red fruit, spiced just enough to emphasise and a structure to build stories of heroic wine if you listen carefully. Spain’s the most exciting place, from Galicia to Jerez and from Gredos to the Canaries. Prods a jaded old wine nut to hyperbole and more nonsense.

12% alcohol. Cork. Swap.

96 points. Great.

Lot 22-131 Bodegas Barbadillo Pastora Manzanilla Pasada En Rama

An incredible bargain from the shelves of Dan Murphy’s ethanol barns. Normally about $AU40 reduced to a members’ offer for $AU21, a whole 750ml bottle too, not a half. I’ve already banged on about how Barbadillo are doing great things for the quality of their sizeable bit of El Marco, but really, this is delicious. What is old is new again in a sense as this is a revival of the first Manzanilla ever bottled in 1827 as the back label says. Reading the excellent sherrynotes.com website it seems this is taken from the vast Solear solera as a six year old and moved in barrels to the La Pastora bodega a street away for a further three years for the flor to abate, pasada. This shows in a deeper yellow than the standard Solear. It’s beautifully rounded in smell and taste with yeast mixed down into salty sea smells, dry chamomile and mellow yellow apple and apricot fruit. A long rich and clean end spiked with a tang of salty bitterness. History and renewal of a special wine place. Hankering for a return visit.

15% alcohol. Cork. $21 ludicrous.

95 points.

A 2024 bottling was just a good even if it took a while to unfurl. Bit more definition in the flavour department, great yellow apple and clingstone peach, a shimmer of almond paste and over brewed chamomile tea. Great consistency over bottles.

2016 Vigneti Boveri Giacomo Freisa La Cappelletta Colli Tortonesi

Another label for the train spotter boy in every old man wine lover I reckon. Shame I managed to get the photo out of focus as it’s one thing this wine doesn’t lack. A string of Italian names that probably mean little to most except the venerable Piemonte hound looking for value. This got a great review on The Wine Front, that most entertaining of sites. An essential resource when browsing the auction site. A few years in bottle have done nothing to interfere with the cheerful bite and depth of great grapes here. Loads of just picked dark cherries and that amazing rockiness that comes in layer after layer. Touches of woody herb and black olives. Great measures of brilliant fruit and contrasting geological flavour, assuming it’s possible to taste such things. Not hard to see Freisa’s part in parenting Nebbiolo. Shame it was my only bottle. In Piemontese terms of value these days, a bargain.

13.5% alcohol. Cork. $55 RRP.

95 points, it’s that good.

1999 Château Pierre Bise Anjou Villages Sur Spilite

Hello stranger. This was a wine I fell in love with over twenty years ago when it was imported by a wine loving doctor from the industrial town of Newcastle NSW where beer was perhaps more the drink. Think it was about $25 a bottle and it seemed such great value compared to equivalent quality Bordeaux. A blend of Franc and Sauvignon Cabernets I remember. Andrew Jefford’s ground breaking book The New France has a profile of the great Claude Papin of Château Pierre Bise and his devotion to the geology of Anjou. According to google, Spilite is a volcanic rock that comes into contact with sea water as it cools. Maybe along with schist, it’s one of the stones of black Angers? Geology aside, Claude Papin and sons also grow some grapes of great quality. This was still lively and had me wishing I had aged as well. The cork was still in good nick, came out in one piece and the only stains were on the tip highlighted with pretty tartaric crystals. Dusty old wine smells with still some gravel, leaf and rich dried cherries. Rounded and still some richness in the mouthful. Again dark berries, cassis and cherries with some concentration and a satisfying round chew of extract and rocky minerals. Great skin tannin hanging in there, freshened by still bright Loire acidity. Plateau or gentle decline, certainly no waiting needed. Couldn’t believe my luck to win a few bottles at auction for a lot less than the original RRP. A nerdy triumph.

12.8% alcohol. Cork. $17 including buyers’ premium and delivery.

93 points.

2022 Domaine de Cassiopée Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Beaune Les Côtés

One of the great things about swapping some bottles with someone who’s on it when it comes to good wine made with less intervention is the chance to open bottles like this. Not the best metaphor but their choices are a great filter. A glass full of great contrasts. Full yellowish green colour and aromas full of crème brûlée and citrus zest. More complexity in peach and a bit of apricot in a faint mist of yeasty nattiness. A rich and satisfying mouthful of the same stretches long on honey drizzled hazelnuts. It all winds up nice and tight on chalk dust acidity and skin chew. Feels good. Less natty second day and rich and even. Excellent adventure.

Rest of the label has Cassiopeia.

12% alcohol. Cork. Great swap.

93 points.

NV Girard – Bonnet Au Bout du Chemin Chardonnay premier cru

A birthday bottle of bubbles for the dear ones from a favourite bit of Champagne, the Côtes des Blancs and the village of Vertus. Mostly biodynamic 2021 grapes with some reserve. Some oak fermented, most in stainless steel, the wood has barely left a thumb print. It had the sort of composure and poise that marks brilliant fruit and gifted making and a compulsion to keep sipping. Pristine cleanliness and a good measure of warm yeasty brioche proved a prelude to crystalline citrus and a little tang of white peach or melon. Long and linear with bursts of fruit and measured salinity right to the end of the road, just as the label says. It’s the texture that’s separates this breed of BdB from the humdrum celebration bubbles. Slides as it glides, tingles and just so touches of feathery texture, utter pitch perfect mouth music. Nicely dry but fruit rich, a low dosage of 3g. A real treat. A bottle between four really should have been a magnum. Rarely has a last half glass of fizz been enjoyed as much.

12.5% alcohol. Diam. A very well chosen swap.

94 points.

2018 Blue Poles Allouran

A Margaret River version of a Merlot and Cabernet Franc blend. All very clean and fresh still with maybe the variety characteristics write large in the candid Australian way. Loads of leaf, sweet red capsicum, plum, raspberry and mint both in smell and flavour, seasoned with some spice and biscuit oak. In shape and texture, it’s plush and velvety, with a counter attack of cool gravel. As energising as a dip under a cool wave on a bright Australian beach day. Different but good. Blue Poles and White Horses.

13.8% alcohol. Screw cap. $30.

93 points.

2019 Giant Steps Syrah Carignan Grenache

Sometimes the sum of the parts in a blend can be more than the individual bits, maybe. Despite thinking Pinot Noir is complete in its own wonder, I must admit to really enjoying some of the more recent Pinot and Shiraz blends from the Yarra Valley. This proved to be another delicious bottle of mixing things up. Perhaps made to be drunk in its vigorous youth, lots of what seems to be whole berries, it nonetheless was still fresh and remarkably deep a few years on. Lots of vivid very ripe raspberries, some mint and touch of pepper trimmed by some sappy stem herbs. Lush and for want of a better word, slurpable. Gentle skin tannin and acidity. Hard to stop sipping until the bottles all gone. It’s nice to go travelling but it’s just a good to drink local at home.

13.5% alcohol. Screw cap. $35 ish.

93 points but more delicious than some with more points.

2022 Domaine Bitouzet Prieur Meursault

Didn’t think I’d be lucky enough to type the word Meursault in a post again but when one was included in a swap, the only thing to do was find the corkscrew. Rich in perfume and colour, this needed a long double decant and then another to shed some of the sulphide meatiness and round out a bit. Lots of compact concentration in smell and taste that seemed nicely balanced with a well meshed touch of skin texture and excellent acidity that carried a cracking depth of flavour. Those flavours indeed, perhaps auto suggestion but hazelnut and honey loomed large with a dash of yellow fruit and figgy richness. Maybe a bit too much bitter sulphide for me but nobody else seemed to complain, so don’t mind my foible. As a whole there’s a range of deep flavour beautifully floated on upper class acidity and texture. A treat to venture maybe one last time into a place where the entrance price makes me envy the very rich label drinker, more than I’d like to admit.

13.5% alcohol. Cork. Glad the generous swap avoided mentioning the cost.

94 points. Maybe less for the technically minded. Maybe more for the Chardonnay lovers that see a bit of that old matchbox as essential?