Archive for category 96-100
Le Dix de Los Vascos – 2004 Cabernet Savignon
Posted by Jeff in 96-100, Cabernet Sauvignon, Red, Wine on 5 February 2010
If you’ve read much on this site, you’ll no doubt be aware that Los Vascos is one of our favorite vineyards. At the entry and reserve level, wines from Los Vascos are an excellent value, rivaling significantly more expensive Californian varieties. Le Dix de Los Vascos is the vineyard’s most expensive offering, at slightly over $50 a bottle. This is not an easy bottle of wine to find – even in a large city with high end wine dealers, you’ll be lucky to find a bottle. So if you have the fortune to find one, should you buy it? Absolutely.
Le Dix is one of the most fragrant wines I’ve ever encountered. Richly floral with tobacco and smoke overtones, my sister described the bouquet as, “smelling like something I would really want to eat.” Produced in limited quantities and oak aged for 18 months, Le Dix certainly exhibits strongly oaked overtones with significant tannins and spice, though perfectly balanced. In short, it is a prototypical cab. Excellent mouth feel, dark fruit flavors, and wonderful body – there’s really nothing bad to say about this wine, but neither is there any one thing that stands out.
What this is really, is an excellently refined Cabernet that isn’t loud or flashy, but rather makes a name for itself in doing what it does well and letting other things take care of themselves. As an analogy, this wine is not a Lamborghini, but rather a Rolls Royce – truly what a great cab should be. It doesn’t shout or make a name for itself by being brash or flashy, but in trying to achieve perfection – and coming quite close in the process.
Score: 96
CARO – 2005 Cabernet Sauvignon / Malbec (Catena/Rothschild)
We came into a (small) unexpected windfall recently and decided to purchase a nice bottle of wine. Our original plan was to grab Le Dix de Los Vascos, though that turned out to not be something no local wine merchant wanted to sell us. After a very long day of searching, we settled on CARO (CAtena/ROthschild) – a Cabernet / Malbec blend from two fantastically respected vineyards that slots in at just over $40 a bottle.
Opening the bottle releases a pleasant, if unusual bouquet. Not as powerfully fragrant as some other wine’s we’ve reviewed on this site, CARO none the less doesn’t disappoint in the aroma department. Slightly earthy with some sweet notes, the smell is very good, but nothing out of this world. In your mouth CARO is rich and full – thick, almost chewy. Its flavor profile is rich and complex, changing from fruity to spicy to chocolaty sweetness depending on the moment. This isn’t to say it’s a fickle wine, but to say that its many facets intertwine to make one of the most enjoyable wines we’ve ever consumed – in some ways it is all things to all men, that it might please as many as possible.
The real virtue of this wine, I think, is in its character. It is not a wine that is easily approachable or understandable. It’s the girl who doesn’t tell you everything about herself on the first date, or the second, or the third, but who keeps getting more interesting every time you meet her, until finally you don’t want to be with anyone else.
Score: 96
Hoegaarden
Earlier this week I came to the realization that I haven’t had a beer in over a month. Between vacations and travel and spending time in the boonies, I’ve probably only had one beer in the past 2-3 months, and that was at the airport in Atlanta. Something that certainly needed to be corrected. Another thing that needed to be corrected was the lack of a review of Hoegaarden, one of my favorite beers, and one of the best Wits around.
I’m not ashamed to admit that the first time I had Hoegaarden, it was because of the funny name and the cool bottle. It took about one sip to convince me I’d stumbled across one of the world’s truly great beers. Since the price differential between this and other American made Wits has dropped significantly (only about $0.50 more than New Belgium’s offerings), I can’t think of any reason at all to stay domestic.
If your idea of a Belgian White is Blue Moon, think again. Hoegaarden’s light body, complex balance of orange and coriander, and unique flavor gained from a special strand of yeast that grows literally nowhere else make completely set it apart from any imitator. In fact, the only white I’ve ever tasted that is in the same league is the Blanche De Bruxelles I’ve reviewed before. I tend to like the Bruxelles slightly more for its more complex flavor, but I couldn’t really score the Hoegaarden any less.
This beer is not cheap: $10 a six pack. It is less than the Bruxelles ($8 for a 4 pack), but still not what you would call a value beer. Even at that price, though, I consider it a good value, given that it is an excellent example of the Genre, and an overall fantastic beer to drink.
Score: 97
Blanche De Bruxelles
In my review of New Belgium’s Mothership Wit, I praised its light and fruity character. Blanche De Bruxelles is a high end, considerably more expensive Belgian white, at well over 2 dollars a beer. Poured side by side, it’s clear which of these beers is the real McCoy – Mothership Wit is far more translucent and far more golden. The Blanche De Bruxelles has a deep, rich, complex flavor – above and beyond the complexity of Mothership, which I scored a 95. More fruity with a clear and prounounced taste of coriander, this beer combines light and clean body with rich and full flavor.
Ultimately, Mothership Wit, standing on its own, is a beer to enjoy and praise. Side by side with the Blanche De Bruxelles, it is a beer to ignore.
Score: 97
Carlsberg
One of my all time favorite beers, Carlsberg is a lager unlike any other. Bright and golden in color, it differs from its German cousins with a far more robust malty flavor. Smooth and slightly sweet, with only a hint of bitterness, Carlsberg is a full-flavored beer that would go equally well with a meal or on a hot summer day. Available in various locals for close to $7 a six pack, this is definitely a beer worth picking up.
Score: 97