Midweek drinking (6th to 9th March)

[Embee]

Another enjoyable Chianti Classico from the Fontodi stable here tonight…

…this time a Filetta di Lamole 2017 ( from a 600m altitude vineyard ).

Medium ruby with a watery rim in the glass. Sour but ripe cherry and berry fruit, baking spices, and a floral quality on the nose. Similar notes on the deeply flavoured, medium bodied palate. Fresh acidity and powdery tannins provide lovely structure, texture, and drinkability to the deliciously sour red fruited flavours.

And spot-on with my simple pasta dinner too…

…as ordinary as it looks it was really tasty all the same. Leaving the pork and butter bean sauce to mature for 24 hours in the fridge seemed to add to its depth of flavour, mind. Now looking forward to testing the 48 hour version tomorrow !

[adbdorset]

Always sad when it’s the last one but these have all been delicious and I think great value .

Fortunately a few 2018s to come

[Rafa]

@adbdorset

Always sad when it’s the last one but these have all been delicious and I think great value

That’s a cracking wine! I too have a case of the 2018, excellent value.

[adbdorset]

Any thoughts on 2019 @Rafa ?

[cnssjw]

Tonight, bottle 3 of 4 of an old favourite:

Le Clos des Cazaux Vacqueyras Cuvée des Templiers 2014

Popped and poured, too soon after taking it out of the wine fridge as it turns out. Sediment on the cork.

Medium garnet in the glass, with a bouquet of black fruits and olives. The black fruit continues in the mouth, with spice, presumably from the higher percentage of Syrah in this vintage.

Still with a good lick of acidity, tannins barely noticeable and a suggestion of liquorice and tapenade on the long finish. Lovely wine and sad that we only have one left.

Cheers!

[Rafa]

The only think I know about the 19 is that L&W was asking for customer to register interest.
No idea if it’s available now

[MarkC]

I agree. I still have a 2016 somewhere I think…

[wine.arbitrageur]

@cnssjw

Sediment on the cork.

Tartrate crystals?

Looks a lovely wine. Enjoy!

[cnssjw]

Just my impatience to get the bottle open I think …but thanks.

[lapin_rouge]

@wine.arbitrageur

Tartrate crystals?

Looks a lovely wine

Oz Clarke (I think?) said that it was a good sign, indicating a low intervention wine.

[Tannatastic]

I think it means the wine hasn’t undergone cold filtration - ISTR some Sauternes being delivered on a particularly cold day a few years ago, and the bottles being absolutely full of them. Since disappeared.

[peterm]

@lapin_rouge

it was a good sign, indicating a low intervention wine.

Yes, it is and it does.

Mass market wines don’t have them because customers return bottles thinking they’re bits of glass in white wine (in red wines they are dyed red and are part of the sediment, or stuck to the cork), so supermarket wines are ‘cold stabilised’, which mean they are chilled till the tartrates crystalise then the wine is pumped out leaving the tartrate crystals behind.

[strawpig]

A little later than planned, sorry. Wednesday was an Italian wine evening for me too. Nebbiolo tasting at Dvine Cellars in Clapham. Really nice evening and an interesting way of doing a tasting where they poured and introduced three of the wines and then presented us with a cheeseboard and left us to it, then poured and presented the next three wines and another cheeseboard and left us to it (then a final surprise bonus wine).

Round 1: High Altitude (Alta Piemonte and Valtellina)

Travaglini Coste della Sesia Nebbiolo 2019

(Thankfully this doesn’t come in the stupid shaped bottle that their Gattinara does!). Exotic on the nose with pomegranate, treacle and goth shop (I’d imagine incense? patchouli?) but doesn’t really deliver. Slightly metallic acidity and not much length. Pleasant enough but not amazing

Carleone Boca 2012

More like it. Old school Nebbiolo with violets, cherries. More wood than I’d normally go for, but it’s well integrated, bags of acidity and a really long fruity finish. (In a actually sat there drinking it this was the wine of the night)

Balgera Rosso Valtellina “450” 2016

Didn’t show its age at all. Very pale high altitude wine with lots of plums, dried fennel and strawberry bootlaces. Lightly spicy in the mouth and I guess just a hit of leather at the end. I felt that this one tasted like I wanted the first one to (but didn’t smell as good!).

Round 2: Low altitude (Ruero and the B’s)

A couple of Ruero icons up next.

Matteo Correggia “Roche d’Ampsej” 2016 en magnum

I should start this by saying a lot of people really liked this one, but it was not for me. Too much new oak meant it didn’t do what I want from my Nebbiolo. Clearly well made, but the things the oak brought overpowered any delicacy from the fruit and it was just a bit sweet.

Sandrone Nebbilolo Valmaggiore 2015

Young, but wow this is a great wine (as you’d hope at £45 a bottle!). Very floral with violets and roses jumping out of the glass (I like this mental image). Slightly sweet tannins and strawberries make it really nice to drink now but it’s got plenty of potential

Albino Rocca Barbaresco “Ronchi” (notes didn’t include a vintage, but it’s clearly not very old!)

Polished, linear and clean. Like drinking velvet. Black fruits, tannins and just starting to get a slightly spicy tobacco note. Really very good and a cut above everything else we’ve had, but also didn’t bring as much joy as the Boca.

Surprise Extra wine Cavalotto Bricco Boschis Barolo 2013 en magnum

What can I say. I love this wine, but it is a decade too young at least. This will be a real superstar. Everything is there, lovely fruit and masses of oomph all wrapped in a velvet glove but at the moment it is a tannic mess. Do not approach!

[Tannatastic]

@strawpig

Cavalotto Bricco Boschis Barolo 2013 en magnum

To misquote the Bishop of Bath and Wells - “what depths of depravity is this, what creature would sink so low as to drink this from a magnum??”.

[strawpig]

Clearly me. I had extreme magnum envy and went in search of them as soon as I got home.

I’ll except the description from the baby eating (drinking?) bishop though.

[Aspedini]

That made me smile. One of my favourite characters in anything, ever.

[Inbar]

@Aspedini

One of my favourite characters in anything, ever.

“I’ll do anything to anything” never fails to start a bout of hysterics…!

[m4rk]

Domaine du Cayron Gigondas 2013. Sweet nose, blackberries/blackcurrant, dark cherry, a bit of barnyard; big, has a sense of sweetness going on, and yet savoury as well. Has a lovely openness to it, fun without being frivolous. Seems to develop in the glass by the minute! Smooth and slightly chalky tannins; probably still has room for more development.
Opened a couple of nights ago; finishing this afternoon

[lapin_rouge]

(Pic shamelessly stolen from 'tinterweb)

Julien Sunier 2017 Morgon from Roberson. Opened lunchtime so now has had 6 hours to breathe which it needed being tight-knit initially.

This is to my mind at the very apex of Beaujolais; NOT over-extracted like so many cru’s, nor that other vice ‘made in a Burgundian fashion’. Medium bodied, a deep rich scarlet with brick rim & ever so slightly cloudy (another tick, not hyper filtered) with light & thin legs of glycerine.

Nose… farmyardy & pine, but otherwise not a lot. Palate is everything: bright & complex… yes violets or perhaps orchids, mostly high-end with very little bass notes, raspberry, plums, minerality one rarely notes…and the glass is finished. This is what Beaujolais is all about: wine to enjoy.

Difficult to define… all I can say is it is very good indeed. I wish I bought more at the time.