A few blitzkrieg notes on a bevy of bottles tasted recently…

2002 KIRRALAA Indelible Reserve Shiraz   Warm lush glycerin-ey fruit with nutty blackberry, earth and significant polish but bright and lively.  Sharp acidity with thin fruit and a bit tannic.

2011 CINQUAIN CELLARS Reserve Malbec  Shied’s  David Rodstgart offering, round and rotten typical crazy malbec overwhelming floral, lily spice and peppery with oak dominant.  Very dry finish.

2006 SAWYER Bradford Meritage  Bright spice and mellow oak, minimal round berry black cherry comes off a bit abrasive but trancends to fine sandpaper finish.  Understated and classic.  Never be a crowd-pleaser, just Rutherford at subdued elegance.

LE CUVIER Chardonnay NV “Bottled 2014”  Orange and brown covered in ripe bug-spray and petrol sweetness and tired nothingness.  Who on earth can like these wines.  Consistently surprises me their fan-appeal.  These are not wines.  These are oxidized, dirty, flabby, disgusting musses.  15-7 and flat gaseous nothing.

2006 LE CIGARE VOLANTE   Huge old world funk, rubber and musty. Raspberry tannic black fruit and the usual mid-thinness which comes with this bottle.  I am a huge fan and this is textbook good.

2008 CLOS MIMI  Cabernet McGinley Vineyard   Fat and warm.  The AL and extraction issues are showing hard on this one.  The wonderfullness of youth are wrinkling hard and coming off oxidized and flabby.  Fruit heading South.  Losing interest and aplomb.

2003 MONTES FOLLY  Serious polish and cellar-nuances, but bright acidic funk, tons of barnyard and fruit.  Very VERY nice.

2011 JUSTIN Tempranilo Reserve  Just a baby, with oak and acid predominant with great pepper finish.

CALCAREOUS Malbec Reserve  Cinnamon nutmeg mint heady wood, bright but flat and bitter.

DES-PAR-ADA Sackcloth & Ashes.  BDX blend.  Fat and flabby with overt hi notes of black tobacco and leather killing all fruit.  Boring, over-extracted and uninteresting.  I just can’t get behind these wines.

2013 JOHANSEN BDX blend  No oak and somewat dark and dreary.  Good balance but nothing overwhelming.  Just a baby (barrel sample).  A strange cross-section of thin and flabby.  Incredible minerality.  Possible potential.

2012 BRIAN BENSON James Berry Syrah   Huge flat tapenade electrical fire acid flat hot and little fruit of merit.

2012 LAURUS CdP  Initial funk loveliness re-directs to mellow nutty fruit.  Classic stuff and a great PP.  Earthy but bright.  Will reward in several years.