Spent a day listening to classical music with Rainer, later joining my parents for dinner.
Prager Riesling “Lieblich” Weissenkirchen Klaus 2005
Thanks to Rainer. A Smaragd that refused to ferment dry, thus “lieblich” (off-dry). Full lightly golden yellow-green colour. Intense flintstony minerality, almost a bit salty. Spices and herbs, strong grapefruit rind bitter note, ripe fruit yet quite firm acidity. Gooseberry, carambola and lightly roasted apple. Concentrated and rather full-bodied. A bit warming with alcohol, more of a warming aftertaste than consistent finish. Some viscosity. Medium length. Interesting and attractive wine, borderline balance. Rounder and more harmonious after 24 and 48 hours in the fridge. Now definitely tastes like an off-dry Smaragd – personally prefer “real” (dry) ones, though. Rating: 91-
Coche-Dury Puligny-Montrachet Les Enseignères 2001
A bottle I opened for Rainer and my parents. Strawy yellow-golden colour, looks youthful and fresh. Highly aromatic, noble and lightly tannic on the palate, faintly thistle oil tinged fruit, complex tarragon and lime, softer basil and faint peach and poached pear, too. Oily yet with lovely acidity. Impressively minerally. Extremely long and very subtle and finesseful. The 13.5% alcohol is perfectly integrated, as is the oak (tempting to say there hardly is any noticeable). A lively wine, concentrated but far from heavy-handed Puligny as we love it. Softly hazelnutty, perhaps fractionally less thick and full-flavoured after 24 and 48 in the fridge. While I love Coche-Dury’s wines (seems as if they are inevitably a step up in category, such as here, a 1er Crus that is as good as most producer’s Grand Crus), I am not convinced they profit from bottle age – it seems as if every bottle I have ever had (too few) drank perfectly right when the cork was pulled (i.e. there is an almost disturbing, ageless quality to his wines). Rating: 93-/92(-?)
Casa Ferreirinha Barca Velha 1985
Thanks to Rainer, a very well-stored bottle (the wine can be murky if not). Apparently the last vintage of Barca Velha made by Nicolau de Almeida himself? Plummy ruby, opaque at the center. A little scorched earth and attractive tobacco to plummy Port-like fruit that is no longer as exotic and complex, but still almost as jammy and sweet as in the nineties when we ordered every bottle we could find on restaurant wine lists. Started out blurry-quincy and rather short on the finish, but grew longer, rounder and more red-fruity and focused with airing (needs to be decanted and aired for at least half an hour to an hour). Prettily rosemary-flavoured tannin, neither rustic nor dry, merely a bit more one-dimensional than it used to be. Fascinating sea salt note (rather than actual minerality). Holding up well in bottle, but has definitely lost some of its early exotic Port-like charm and burliness. Rating: 92-/91-?
Greetings from Switzerland, David.
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„J'ai gâché vingt ans de mes plus belles années au billard. Si c'était à refaire, je recommencerais.“ – Roger Conti