We have a few wines planned for tonight, the first of which has been a pleasing surprise.
Riesling Spätlese Serringer Schloss Saarstein 2005, Schloss Saarstein
Unlike previous bottles of this that I have opened, this smells quite clean and has a more pronounced mineral character. It has good peachy fruit. It is obviously pretty ripe. There is a bit of spritz on the palate, along with really nice fruit, good minerality and a nice backbone of acidity. It has a degree of complexity and reasonable length. Not great by any means, but quite a nice drink.
Riesling Polish Hill 2004, Grosset
This has shut down a tad since [link2post id=”1505″]I last had it a year ago[/link2post]; it has lost a bit of the lively lime character. It is still quite mineral, and it has a lot of style. Just seems awkward and middle-aged (I am middle-aged and I am awkward). I still think this has a good future in front of it and I would not hesitate to recommend it to anyone. Just age it for a bit before you drink it.
Gigondas Prestige des Hautes Garrigues 1998, Domaine Santa Duc
Robert Parker gave this 93 points and said it’d age until 2018. He is very well paid and drinks a lot of wine, of course. This honks of an extremely booze-tastic, Port-like drink; some kind of crazy fortified Mourvedre. There is really rather a lot of jammy fruit on the nose as well. It seems far from balanced. It also seems a touch mature. Ageing this has done the palate no favours, the jammy fruit is not powerful enough to balance the frankly worrying level of alcohol. No balance, rather dirty and far too muscular. If this wine knew where your stolen bottle of Musigny 2005 was and was alone in a room, blind-folded, with its hands tied behind its back and you went in with a cricket bat, you’d be the one walking out in a daze. Can that ever be nice?
You must have been completely boozed up when you wrote that Gigondas tasting note, probably from the Gogondas itself. Stolen bottle of Musigny 05? Cricket bat? What the fxxx are you talking about? What’s the link between the Musigny and the Gignondas having it’s hands tied behind its back??? Make sense you soak!
I like to think I was being clear whilst being poetic, but just to explain: I was suggesting that even if I managed to subdue it in some way whilst I was powered up for heroism, the Gigondas is considerably more of a bruiser than me. Or anyone I know for that matter.
I could have just been rude about it, but I hope that suggesting it was a violent monstrosity of a beast was considerably funnier.
I’ve got a bottle of the filth left. If I don’t give it away to a passing drunk I’ll try out RP’s ageing suggestion just for a laugh. When I mentioned this to the partner he said, “I hope I am dead by the time you get around to opening the second bottle.” I suppose this says something about how enjoyable the wine was.