by Chris Kissack » Mon Jul 27, 2009 2:53 am
Hi David
I think you have this wine nailed with your second comment. It's one of a number of 1998 Southern Rhônes which to me have seemed raisined or baked, soupy and unbalanced. I remember at the time 1998 being touted as a great vintage, but to my palate most of the wines that I have tasted or drank have been disappointing and flabby:
Domaine Santa Duc Gigondas Prestige des Hautes Garrigues 1998: A wine with a fairly rich colour, showing some maturity with an orange-tinged rim. The nose certainly has interest, although with a rather distinctive array of aromas. We have cough candy sticks, Bovril, treacle toffee and most of all sweet, baked, sticky fruit. There is a vegetal character as well, one which, curiously, is more reminiscent of Pedro Ximénez than of Grenache. On the palate the same flavours follow through. This is a rich and rounded wine, but with no point of focus. It has a core of peppery tannins that seem to pervade inwards from the edges, but what acidity there is is completely subsumed by the baked fruit and tannin. It seems rather coarse and carries a rather obvious alcohol which influences the texture greatly; and the label admits to 15%. The finish yields pepper and spice, and little else. Overall, I find this disappointing. I am glad that this is my only bottle. 13/20
In a line-up of numerous southern Rhônes tasted last year I though Beaucastel was excellent, and a couple of others also really very good indeed, but the also-runs outnumbered these successes - including Lucien Barrot, Solitude, Marcoux, Bosquet des Papes and Bosquet des Papes' special cuvée Chantemerle.
