We went to visit a couple of friends Fri night and, when they found out we had no electrical power & so couldn't cook dinner, they invited us to stay for a simple vegetable soup meal. Simple food and very special company, with two pretty good wines:
1. Ridge Calif CabSauv YorkCreek (13.8%; 15% Merlot; Drk: 1/77-1/79) 1974: Med. color w/ very little browning; strong fragrant/perfumed cedary/pencilly/tobaccoy/old Calif Cab slight smokey/pungent slight herbal fairly complex nose; soft/smooth/elegant quite pencilly/cedary/old Cab bit herbal/spicy smooth/polished/elegant quite complex flavor; very long very smooth/polished/elegant quite cedary/pencil shavings light pungent/smokey/tarry slight herbal quite complex finish w/ slight tannic bite on back of palate; lost much of its fruit but a classic/fully-mature old Calif Cab that has come together far better than it had any right to do.
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2. Ridge Calif Zinfandel Essence (SaH: 39%; RS: 9.2%; 13.9%; DusiRanch; Drk: 7/92-7/02) 1991: Very dark color w/ no browning or fading whatsoever; beautiful very intense blackberry/blackberry liquer/essence of jammy/PasoRobles Zin very slight oak slight complex/dusty nose; rather sweet very powerful/intense blackberry/boysenberry/liquer slight chalky/dusty intense PasoRobles/jammy/Smuckers flavor; very long/lingering intense blackberry/boysenberry/liquer quite sweet finish w/ little obvious tannins; huge/powerful ZinEssence fruit w/ no signs of that raisened/pruney character these wines can sometimes develop with age. Stunning Essence but showing little evolution thus far.
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And a wee BloodyPulpit:
1. CS: This was only the 2'nd Cab Ridge made from non-MB grapes (the famed Eisele '71 being the first). Those early Ridge YorkCreeks were pleasant Cabs, rather on the soft/light side; so when John offered this up, I had very low expectations. Especially given that Draper recommending drink by '80. So 25+ yrs beyond its prime.
Whatta surprise this wine was. I was expecting it to be on its last legs, if not dead and gone. It was not. Though most of the fruit had faded, it had this wonderful old Calif Cab pencilly/cedary fragrance and flavor to it. Maybe starting to dry out slightly on the palate, it's still an amazingly good wine. That guy up at Ridge must know a little bit about making wine I would guess. One thing to note is the anemic alcohol level of 13.8%. In this day and age, such an anemic wine would be totally unacceptable and its score would probably not break the 80-pt barrier.
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2. Essence: Ridge (and DavidBruce) pioneered the production of Zin Essence in Calif, Zinfandels harvested at high sugar levels (or normal sugar levels for this day and age), stuck fermentations (or sometimes intential), leaving noticible resddual sugar in the wine. The first one was the '70 Occidental or Jimsomare as I recall. Then they made 2 Essences from Lodi grapes in the mid-'70's. But it was not until the '91 vintage when they returned to this genre, much to my excitement.
These grapes were sourced from BeniDusi's PasoRobles Ranch, at the request from Paul that he leave a block of his Zin to get super-ripe, as I recall the story. I understand that this caused poor Beni no small degree of stress and anxiety to see these grapes out there shriveling into raisens on the vine. Beni is an old-time Calif grape farmer, one of the best in the biz, and takes great pride in the quality of the grapes he delivers to Ridge. After the grapes were harvested and turned into this Essence, I understand that Beni told Paul that he simply could not grow grapes this way and not to ask for these kind of grapes again from him. After all, his reputation as a quality grape grower was on the line. So in the subsequent yrs, and continuing to this day, Ridge makes all their Zin (and PetiteSirah) from grapes up in the LyttonSprings area. And their Essences are some of the greatest ones made in Calif; huge/powerful loads of intense fruit w/o out that raisened/pruney character those wines sometimes show, and w/o the volatile character stuck fermentations can often develop.
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3. These two wines were ones I (probably) sold to John way back when and taken from his cellar. It's nice to renew you acquaintanships with old...errr...long-time friends, be they people or wines.
TomHill
Trick questions for extra credit:
1. What was the characteristic of many of the Ridge labels in the 1974 vintage that irritated many of the Ridge affacinados and in this day and age of the anal/super-whiney wine consumers would prompt a wholesale return of the wines to the winery?
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2. What was the shape of the Ridge Lodi Essence btls?? What yrs were those wines made? What vnyd were they sourced from?
