TN's: Piedmont & Poker (with a '94 Yquem kicker)

[Michael Malinoski]

These notes are long-delayed, but not for lack of excitement about the wines tasted on this afternoon in Billerica back in mid-December. Andy outdid himself with a great wine line-up and his usual amazing cuisine. The poker went into quadruple overtime and still ended in a tie somehow, so the two finalists will split the hosting and wine selection duties for us next time.

All wines were served blind and the underlying theme was not known beforehand. We started with some white wines:

2006 Marchesi di Barolo Gavi Le Lune. The nose marries some crisp herbal, gooseberry, limestone and grass notes to softer elements of honeydew melon and floral notes—though this description makes it sound more complex that it actually is. It is light-bodied and soft-textured, with some mouth-puckering acidity. The fruit concentrates in a small ball of grapey and citrus notes before turning a touch flabby on the finish. Really, this is pretty innocuous.

2006 Cristina Ascheri Roero Arneis. Aromas of fleshy white peach, chalk dust and green botanical herbs are a bit light. It is tight and narrow on entry, rounding out more through the middle and pinching in hard again toward the back. Big streaks of acidity run through this at odd angles, turning sort of sour on the finish. It is still a bit bigger and more serious than the previous wine, with a bit more depth, but again this is not really anything to write home about.

2006 Francois Chidaine Montluis-sur-Loire Les Tuffeaux. Peter generously slotted this one in, not knowing that Andy had the Piedmont concept going. And certainly it stuck out as a whole different style of wine to those of us tasting blind. The nose is effusive, with notes of fine chalk and limestone, lemon rind, a sense of faint botrytis and some Christmas spices. It is rather fleshy in the mouth, with fine depth and a rounded feel. Off-dry flavors of white peach, brown spices and white chocolate are a bit of an unusual blend, but show a lot of character. It’s youthful, but nicely promising.

Red wines:

2004 Luciano Sandrone Barbera d’Alba. There’s lots of sweet dark brambly berry fruit on the nose of this first red. Aromas of crushed blackberry, spiced blueberry, wild stemmy notes, melted licorice and chocolate are rich, strong and heady. In the mouth, it is dense, with full body and a good deal of glycerin showing. There are a ton of chalky tannins that begin to really coat the palate, especially the longer one stays with it. Sweet dark berry and warm chocolate flavors are juicy, plush and caressing at first, but coming back later on seem coarser and a bit more disjointed.

2005 Giacosa Fratelli Barbera d’Alba Bussia. The nose here is entirely different, with a much more lifted sense of raspberries, forest greenery, tree bark, tobacco and creosote on the nose. In the mouth, it fans out nicely to fill all the crevices of the mouth, but has a twangy acidic edge running through it the whole time. The acidity and tannins eventually build up to a crescendo, but the wine stays finely delineated and medium-bodied. Flavors of dark cranberry, dark cherry, smoky spices, and citrus peel combine nicely, but do feel like they’d be more resolved and complete with more time in the cellar.

2001 Giacosa Fratelli Barbaresco Riserva Rio Sordo. There is a lovely nose here of aged leather, dusty old earth, tobacco wrapper, funky forest undergrowth and a hint of sweaty socks combined with red flower petals, dried black cherry and red licorice rope. It all works together quite nicely, actually. In the mouth, it is fresh and racy, but with a sort of aged mellowness running beneath. It has solid drive and length, with a hint of austerity toward the finish. It shows fine spices, red cherry fruit, fuzzy acidity and soft but plentiful tannin. It is on the full-bodied side, but feels sleek and nuanced in a nice way. My red wine of the day, though by a slim margin.

2001 Produttori del Barbaresco Barbaresco Riserva Ovello. This wine reveals aromas of red currants, cherries, flower greens, truffle oil, limestone and gardenias that are fresh, yet deep and earthy. In the mouth, it is rather intense and immediate, and really surprises by taking no prisoners right from the get-go. There are some flowery and spice-laden top notes, but underneath is a lot of smoke and fleshy red fruit that is rounded and serious. It finishes really long, with some austere tannins showing but not really getting in the way too much. It is all a bit too much at times, but I have to say that coming back to this much later in the day, the palate grip has relented a bit and the wine is generally more approachable. I think this is going to be outstanding, but needs at least another few years.

2004 Marcarini Barolo Brunate. Aromas of saddle leather, tobacco leaf, mildly skunky forest greens, smoke and sliced jalapeno ride atop a fine pool of light raspberry fruit, cherry liqueur and dark currants that show a lot of class, complexity and distinction. It has a silky texture in the mouth, and again shows a classy profile. It has a good deal of soft, chalky cherry fruit, white spices and gentle earth. It is medium-bodied and lithe, with polished tannins that do definitely grow with time. There is good intensity and power, yet a sense of restraint that makes it special. My #2 WOTD.

2001 Paolo Scavino Barolo Cannubi. This one is a bit dark and mysterious on the nose early on, with campfire smoke, black cherry, tar, and volcanic ash aromas. Later in the day, it brings in a much sweeter edge to the fruit, along with some confectionary notes. In the mouth, it is more open-textured than most, without quite as much structure. There are plenty of tannins, but they are much less drying it seems than others. It is red-fruited, with some flowery inner-mouth perfume allied to flavors of cranberry and sweet raspberry. It finishes easy, and I have to say it is a wine that really grows on me. My 3rd favorite of the day when all was said and done.

2004 Cascina Bongiovanni Barolo Pernanno. The nose here shows a lot of balsa wood, cedar dust, tomato plant and eucalyptus riding atop some jammy raspberry, kirsch and cherry fruit. In the mouth, it feels equally modern in orientation—with an absolute seamlessness and a luxurious texture. The plum and blueberry fruit is deep, rich and dark—with acidity on the decidedly soft side. It does turn a bit crisper toward the back of the palate, with some chocolaty tannins that begin to clamp down there. This is not a style for staunch traditionalists, but I like it well enough certainly for it to be my #4 wine of the day.

1999 Germano Ettore Barolo Cerretta. As with all of these Nebbiolo-based wines, I really like the nose of this particular offering, though it is real different from many of the others in the line-up. It offers up scents of flower greens, tea leaves, rice paper, grass and creosote that marry in interesting ways with a sweet undercurrent of sour cherry and red currant fruit to make for an earthy yet finesse-driven bouquet. It also has a cooler fruit profile in the mouth than many others in the line-up, with black currants, blackberry and spiced plum fruits that are dense and offset by twangy acids and huge dashes of spice. The problem with the wine is that while nice through the mid-palate, it just clamps down hard and rude on the back of the palate, eventually totally staining the teeth and hurting the mouth. This is not to suggest the wine is heavy or over-done in any way--just that it is extremely unapproachable at this stage of its life (even though it is the oldest of the wines).

2000 Prunotto Barolo Bussia. The nose here shows some espresso, forest scents, green pepper, dark cranberry and an odd cardboard note that taken together are a lot less pretty or engaging than the rest of the line-up. In the mouth, this is a wine on the mellower side of things, with an easy structure and soft, rounded tannins. The acidity sneaks in toward the back of the palate, but otherwise this one comes across as fairly uncomplicated and a bit dull.

That was it for the Piedmont portion of the tasting. It was really a fine line-up, with the five Barolo bottlings each coming from a different commune. I'd like to say that it provided some education on the styles of the different communes, but I admit I need to study up on that subject and spend more time learning what to look for. In a blind setting, it was sort of hard to do that, though I appreciated the opportunity to not be influenced by producers, vineyards or vintages printed on the labels.

All of these wines were certainly young, but it was really educational to see how approachable some of them could be with enough air and paired up with appropriate food. Still others, though, just shouldn’t be touched for a good while. In the end, I would have to say that the tasting did nothing but reinforce my desire to purchase and cellar Nebbiolo-based wines. I'm currently stocking up on 2004's, ostensibly for my girls' birth year, but I'm sure not all of them will last that long before I start checking in on them.

In any event, after all that, Zach and Kyle each brought a blind bottle that they wanted to get some group thoughts on. I believe there may even have been some sort of side bet on which person’s wine would be better liked.

2006 Cameron Hughes Cabernet Sauvignon Lot 75 Oak Knoll District Napa Valley. Man, what a shift this is! It is clearly a Cabernet-based wine, first of all. It kicks things off with aromas of leafy black currants, cool earth tones, green pepper and sweet creosote that combine in a rich, chunky style. It is smooth in the mouth, with a tough spine of acidity and tannin clearly evident. It is rather full-bodied, with a chewy texture and a blocky feel despite the smoothness of the texture. It is like a box of blocks that are not all stacked together—trying to fit in an enclosed space but sort of butting up against each other. It remains chunky and chewy all the way through, with flavors in the cool black fruit register. I don’t really like the style, but concede that it seems really youthful and awkwardly adolescent--so could certainly come around.

2001 Rutherford Grove Cabernet Sauvignon Napa Valley. The nose features mocha, molten chocolate, black currant, leafy greens and perhaps some grilled pepper notes down deep. Sweet soft blueberries and soft generous spices lead the initial wave of flavor, followed by mocha-tinged velvety fruit, graphite and smoke in a relatively full-bodied package. A hint of alcohol seems to be showing through at times, but the wine does have a certain sense of easy generosity that is welcome after the Cameron Hughes. Personally, I gave this wine the head-to-head victory.

With dessert, Andy had a few more blind surprises up his sleeve with these two 375 ml bottles.

1994 Château d’Yquem Sauternes. Ah, this is just lovely on the nose, featuring a gorgeous bouquet of toasted orange peel, spiced orange candy, dried apricots, botrytis creamsicle, mace, crème brulee topping, Lady Grey tea and fresher bits of tangerine fruit. There is no question that this is a wine of class and character. In the mouth, it feels young, with a shot of pure apricot jam and toasted orange peel. It has a nice sense of weight—featuring some airy qualities married to deep bass notes of rich tropical, honeyed fruit. The balance is impressive, with the sweetly sugared notes offset by calming, wide-based acidity. The finish is poised and very long and the whole thing feels like a great relief after all the tannins today.

2001 Bonny Doon Vineyard Muscat Vin de Glaciere California. This is rather musky and comparatively coarse on the nose, offering up heady but funky old mangos and over-ripe, slowly composting tropical fruits on the nose. It is soft and super-sweet on the palate, with a raw sugar component. Sorry, I just don’t want to drink this, and not just because I have the Yquem in my other glass.

-Michael