Bright clear sparkling ruby with pink edges. Thin, cloying, alcohol nose which is simultaneously over-ripe and meager and lacking any redeeming spice or brier or freshness. At the dead-bottom of the bouquet is a mechanical slight-eucalyptus oakiness which hints at redemption, but it is not to be. With breathing, it quickly becomes all fat, glycerin and KMBS.
Go ahead, sip that thing. I dare you. Absolutely no fruit whatsoever in this wine anywhere. The watery entry becomes epic Vitamin C acid before you have a chance to say, “Dam”. Tannin–which I assume is where the flock of fans of this bottle go, “Wow, this thing is HUGE!”–of a completely shallow, unsophisticated type loom over the entire rear 85%. No amount of lab manipulation or gum-arabic could save this bottle. So hyped–and so horrid. Absolutely undrinkable. Why be so hard on this wine? Because people deserve better.
I drink hundreds of bad wines a year but they are INTERESTINGLY BAD. Languedocs and Spanish wines and NZ pinots and 4th-growth BDX and cabs from Lake County and strange blends and and tired stuff and bottles nobody has ever HEARD of and that makes them interesting. This bottle is on every supermarket shelf up and down California and every resty list for 50 miles around here and it is an Event Center and a DESTINATION and people buy and DRINK this stuff and somebody needs to say, “Dude… you KNOW for your 20$ you could be drinking a cab which at least makes you THINK.” Probably won’t link this one to my facebook page. I am sure I would receive death-threats. Oh dear god I just grabbed the last drips in my glass to make sure I wasn’t being unfair and physically choked. It feels like it is coming out my eyes.
2011 CASTORO Cabernet Sauvignon Paso Robles 13.5
Stephen McConnell 