I’ve had two extraordinary bottles recently, both obtained at reasonable expense, and both of which demonstrated the benefit that comes from cellaring. Now, some Readers find reading about someone else drinking wine an astonishingly insipid subject, like having to listen to a co-worker’s detailed description of their morning workout. However, I will reward your slogging through the bulk of this post’s wine bragging with my NFL lock of the week, links to oenological science and a potential travel destination, and a bit of life advice.
The first superb wine was a 1997 Brunello di Montalcino from Donatella. Now, I know you’re thinking, “A fourteen-year-old Brunello. Of course it was going to be good.” That’s not necessarily true on either count. Some wine peaks and then declines sharply over time, others outright vinegar, especially if they have been stored upright. Still, was as good a bet as is taking the 9-3 Ravens -17 hosting the 0-12 Colts (sans Peyton Manning) this weekend. Technically, the outcome is in doubt, any given Sunday or any given bottle, and all that. But come on.
Thing is, we caught this Brunello at its peak — all the character and boldness one would expect from south Tuscany, with plum flavor and alcohol nose in just the right balance. The other wonder is, “How could you have possibly shown so much restraint to have held on to this prince for fourteen years?” I didn’t. The Wife and I bought this bottle in Lucca in May for €50 (from this marvelous vendor), and hand-carried it back home in my luggage. I got much more than my money’s worth.
The other was a 2006 Carrara vineyard Barbera from the Los Olivos boutique Arthur Earl. Pound for pound, I think this is the best winemaker in California, and no one pays me to say that. The Barbera is made in the Tuscan style. I knew I was in for something special when after opening it last night I saw the bottom of the cork covered in tartaric acid crystals. The wine was silky and full of fruit and just a touch sweet, almost brandied like a port but without the cloying filminess you get in a port. Again, it was clear we’d caught it at its peak. Holding on to this one for the last three years has been something of a challenge, but it was made easier by my use of a bottle pen to note the anticipated peak year on the bottle itself upon receipt. Every time I pulled the bottle out to consider it for consumption, I saw the “2012” notation and last night I said, “December 2011 is close enough.”
Like a lot of boutiques, Arthur Earl sells about 95% of its production to club members, which is how I got my bottle. The rest is either sold directly to area restaraunts or consumed by the makers themselves and their employees. I suppose there might be a secondary market, but I just had my last bottle so even if I were to wish to do such a thing, I don’t have one to re-sell to you. That’s a critical part of the essence of the wine experience — you get a bottle and drink it at its peak. It’s an exquisite pleasure. Then it’s gone, and the experience of that wine will never be replicated. That is life itself.
A bottle at its peak is the quintessence of an evanescent pleasure. Eat the peach while it’s ripe, because if you wait too long it rots. So too, you shold drink wine when it’s peaked instead of hanging on to it forever and ever.
My comic book guy has explained to me that Peyton Manning is the league’s MVP this year. I found it difficult to argue beyond the limp and obvious “well, shouldn’t the MVP have played at least one game?”
I think it’s clear that he’s the Most Valuable, but it is certainly arguable whether he is a Player.
As with the Brunello turning out well, once you stop joking around it’s really quite obvious what’s going to happen.
+1
Over Thanksgiving, my dad brought out a bottle of 1994 Trockenbeerenauslese I had given him for Christmas fifteen years ago. It was a delight.
One thing I hope to learn eventually is how to judge which wines to keep, and which wines to drink now. Any recommendations on how to learn?
The best teacher is experience. That’s not very helpful when you first approach the subject. Experience comes slowly, because we’re talking about the passage of time measured in years. And worse of all, there are no hard and fast rules, only guidelines. A way to start is to buy a case of the same wine, have one bottle immediately, and then to space out the next ones every six months or so, to see how it develops. If you want to be anal about it, keep a tasting notebook. So just like you’ve learned to sophisticate your palate through the experience of tasting, the process of cellaring will come with doing it.
There’s a suggestion floating around that wine should age for at least twice the time it was barrelled, and peaks at six times its barrelling, which is at best a super-rough guideline. But I do feel confident advising that wines barrelled in (or with) oak should definitely age longer than ones barrelled in steel.
Your knowledge of the varietal will educate you. A higher-sugar wine (zinfandel) will peak faster than a high-tannin wine (cabernet). I say, the more tannic the red, the longer it sits because I like the tannins to mellow. You can get a hint about the tannic content without opening the bottle by getting a sense of its color; the dark glass wine bottles are typically made out of will frustrate that but it isn’t impossible. If you get a sense of an orange lip around the surface of the wine, it’s likely past its peak and should be drunk immediately before it sours. Sadly, you may not be able to see that until you pour it. So again, all the educated guesswork about color, varietal, and barrelling isn’t going to completely substitute for experience.
All this applies only to reds. Please don’t tell me you let your whites get old enough for this to be an issue; if somehow you do, chances are we’re talking about salad dressing instead of wine. My oldest white is a 2009 and it’s going to be consumed before the new year.
Well, now I wonder why such a high-sugar white wine seemed to last so well.
Anyhow, thanks for the tips! I’ll see if I can get the Better Half to go along with my plan to start buying cases of wine.
Maybe he’d kept it really, really cold while cellaring it?
Of course, the pleasure you got from the wine is what counts. And the shared experience of sharing a message from the past with your father, which adds a special degree of sweetness.
If you live in the great white north, you probably have a house with a basement, and there’s something about cellars and wines that goes hand in hand. Before I picked my spot in the basement for the wine cellar, I bought one of those digital thermometers that has a min/max button on it. I put it where I was planning on cellaring the wine and (actually) forgot about it for several months, which was a good thing. When I wandered back there to look at it, I found the spot had not deviated more than 2 deg from the 6o it was at. Over 9 years that is still the case, although I’ve accidentally left the door open and warmed it up a tad that I regret (got as high as 65 after a week).
Wine /really/ doesn’t like fluctuating temperature, which is why I’m nervous about buying old wine that I find on store shelves. I never know how they’ve stored it (and it’s almost invariably displayed vertically – so you can read the label) or where (a distribution warehouse that isn’t climate controlled?)
Thank you “Burt” for the flattering comments regarding the Barbera and Arthur Earl. Just for everyone’s information, we only sell about 50 percent to our wine club with the rest (except for what we drink” sold at our tasting room in Los Olivos, so (almost) everyone can get some. Production on the 2006 Barbera was 255 cases. Thanks again “Burt.”
Awesome, thanks for reading, Art! How much of the ’06 Barbera is still in stock? Now that I know there’s more to be had, I intend that one of those cases shall soon have my (real) name on it.
As of today we still have an adequate supply of 2006 Barbera. You are not yet in danger of missing out. But, we will be watching carefully for the (real) names of everyone who buys a case.