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Default Zin Notes

We did a Zinfandel blind tasting recently, a departure for most of us
that rarely drink zins (although I have been a long time fan).

First wine was a starter, not in theme.

2009 Vincent Raimbault Vouvray – initial impression was sulphur and
more sulphur, but it did slowly blow off leaving some melon in its
wake. Sweetish entry but OK acidity. so so.

1979 Monterey Peninsula Winery Wilpete Farms Willow Creek Zinfandel
(13.9% - I figured that I’d fool them and bring a really venerable
bottle that I’d picked up in the early 80s at the winery when I’d been
down in Monterey racing old sports cars. Well, it wasn’t really at
the winery, it was at a small sales room off the main road where all
sorts of things were sold. I recall standing next to a rather large
(and loud) lady at the tasting room bar. We were tasting through a
range of single vineyard low production zins. She said (well, more
bellowed) that the ‘Monterey Nights’ (or whatever forgettable name it
was called) red wine she’d just tasted was ‘Damned fine” and that
she’d buy a gallon jug…..

This wine was huge when young and needed many years to become
drinkable. I’d opened a bottle a few years ago and it was corked, so I
crossed my fingers and tried my last one. The wine was almost pinot
noir in colour, although without the brick tinge normally found with
mature pinots. The mature nose had some spice interest. The wine slid
across the tongue smoothly (as, I suppose, had the Monterey Nights,
come to that, but I refrained from finding out back in the day), and
had lost all tannin, but retained some cassis flavour and medium
length. Everyone pretty much liked it.

2007 Peter Franus Napa Zin – instant blueberries in the glass, sweet
entry, soft and long (not the desired combination for every occasion…)
finishing sweet. Vanilla was the one note that pretty much dominated
this. Not a big fan.

1997 Turley Old Vines Zin – the first of a string of Turleys, this one
is the blended version and it ultimately failed to impress me,
although I immediately (perhaps more luck than skill) said ‘Turley?’
as soon as I smelled it. Very ripe raspberry fruit nose clean on
palate with pretty good balance and length but something not quite
right in the middle. May just be getting to old? 15.1%

1997 Turley Duarte Zin (Contra Costa County) – I had to pull this out
(my back up bottle) when the first one appeared. Medium colour (as
have a lot of these wines at this age), big earthy bramble/blackberry
nose with some white pepper and spice that followed through on palate.
several rungs up from the Old Vines. 15.5%

1997 Turley Dogtown Zin (Lodi) – perhaps the most pleasurable of the
three with a fairly sweet berry fruit nose, spicy balanced middle, and
long soft finish.

2007 Hendry Block 24 Primitivo – dusty fruit nose with hints of anise,
huge concentration on palate, and quite sweet. Not sure if this is
going to improve or if it is as good as it will get. Not my style.
Presumably used the Primitivo label in an attempt to attract
attention.

2007 Scherrer Old and Mature Zin (Alexander Valley) – on the other
hand, this IS my style of zin. A Rhone/earthy element in the nose and
more raspberry fruit, nicely rounded and sweet on palate with very
decent finish. Nice wine.

1995 Rosenblum Late Harvest Zin – sweet simple nose, with
concentration overwhelming any complexity, very sweet in the mouth,
pleasant, and with the fruit settling in as red rather than black
after a bit. Not bad – I could almost but not quite forgive them for
using the same sort of foo-foo tall, small diameter half size bottle
that many of our BC wineries use for their hyped up so called ice
wines. If you want a zin to serve in little chocolate cups, this is
it. Also not my style of zin, and a waste of grapes that might
otherwise have been used in a decent dry wine.

I preferred some of the old Shenandoah zins that were often high
proof, less sweet, but came across as better more interesting zin
based dessert wines, or Andrew Quady’s older ‘Ports’ before he went
away from zin and into port varietals (I recall a 1978 Lot 2 that was
particularly memorable.) Heck, I probably prefer Ficklin to the
Rosenblum, although I haven’t tasted their product recently.

Mixed but very interesting bag.
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Default Zin Notes

On Feb 26, 10:56*am, "Bill S." > wrote:
> We did a Zinfandel blind tasting recently, a departure for most of us
> that rarely drink zins (although I have been a long time fan).


> 1979 Monterey Peninsula Winery Wilpete Farms Willow Creek Zinfandel
> (13.9% - I figured that I’d fool them and bring a really venerable
> bottle that I’d picked up in the early 80s at the winery when I’d been
> down in Monterey racing old sports cars. *Well, it wasn’t really at
> the winery, it was at a small sales room off the main road where all
> sorts of things were sold. *I recall standing next to a rather large
> (and loud) lady at the tasting room bar. We were tasting through a
> range of single vineyard low production zins. She said (well, more
> bellowed) that the ‘Monterey Nights’ (or whatever forgettable name it
> was called) red wine she’d just tasted was ‘Damned fine” and that
> she’d buy a gallon jug…..
>
> This wine was huge when young and needed many years to become
> drinkable. I’d opened a bottle a few years ago and it was corked, so I
> crossed my fingers and tried my last one. The wine was almost pinot
> noir in colour, although without the brick tinge normally found with
> mature pinots. The mature nose had some spice interest. The wine slid
> across the tongue smoothly (as, I suppose, had the Monterey Nights,
> come to that, but I refrained from finding out back in the day), and
> had lost all tannin, but retained some cassis flavour and medium
> length. Everyone pretty much liked it.


I once had a few bottles of Monterey Peninsula Winery wines. My early
impression of some of their Zinfandels and Cabernet Sauvignons from
the 1970s was that they often were as big and dark as some wines from
David Bruce, and that says a lot. You needed to make an appointment
with a dentist for cleaning your teeth before drinking some of these
young monsters :-). I only still have 1 bottle of their 1976 Cabernet
Sauvignon and a few half bottles of their Ferrero Ranch Late Harvest
1976 Zinfandel which is dryish. I have not tasted these for several
years.
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Default Zin Notes

Bill S. wrote:
> We did a Zinfandel blind tasting recently, a departure for most of us
> that rarely drink zins (although I have been a long time fan).


> 1979 Monterey Peninsula Winery Wilpete Farms Willow Creek Zinfandel
> (13.9% - I figured that I’d fool them and bring a really venerable
> bottle that I’d picked up in the early 80s at the winery when I’d been
> down in Monterey racing old sports cars. Well, it wasn’t really at
> the winery, it was at a small sales room off the main road where all
> sorts of things were sold. I recall standing next to a rather large
> (and loud) lady at the tasting room bar. We were tasting through a
> range of single vineyard low production zins. She said (well, more
> bellowed) that the ‘Monterey Nights’ (or whatever forgettable name it
> was called) red wine she’d just tasted was ‘Damned fine” and that
> she’d buy a gallon jug…..
>
> This wine was huge when young and needed many years to become
> drinkable. I’d opened a bottle a few years ago and it was corked, so I
> crossed my fingers and tried my last one. The wine was almost pinot
> noir in colour, although without the brick tinge normally found with
> mature pinots. The mature nose had some spice interest. The wine slid
> across the tongue smoothly (as, I suppose, had the Monterey Nights,
> come to that, but I refrained from finding out back in the day), and
> had lost all tannin, but retained some cassis flavour and medium
> length. Everyone pretty much liked it.


Fun tasting, Bill, and great story to boot! As I no doubt have
mentioned before, when I moved to NYC (with two cases of wine in tow) I
had to adjust to the lack of availability of many of the wines I'd been
drinking in CA. In '87 or '88, though, Jean and I stumbled across a
cache of '79 Monterey Peninsula Zin in a small, otherwise forgettable
liquor store on Broadway near Columbia. For the next few months, we
drank down their stock which at that point was rounding into shape and
quite drinkable (owing no doubt to the advanced aging due to poor storage)

> 1997 Turley Old Vines Zin – the first of a string of Turleys, this one


IIRC, '97 was the vintage in which Turley turned down the volume
slightly and started making more balanced wines. Interesting to hear
how these have aged.


> 1995 Rosenblum Late Harvest Zin – sweet simple nose, with
> concentration overwhelming any complexity, very sweet in the mouth,
> pleasant, and with the fruit settling in as red rather than black
> after a bit. Not bad – I could almost but not quite forgive them for
> using the same sort of foo-foo tall, small diameter half size bottle
> that many of our BC wineries use for their hyped up so called ice
> wines. If you want a zin to serve in little chocolate cups, this is
> it. Also not my style of zin, and a waste of grapes that might
> otherwise have been used in a decent dry wine.


In the old days ('70s) these "late harvest" Zins were often the result
of a stuck fermentation. These days, with all the designer yeasts
available to winemakers, I don't know if stuck fermentations still
happen, but perhaps we can explain this wine away as an unfortunate
accident ;-)

Mark Lipton
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