Tried another remnant from TheBarneyBox last night:
1. The FirestoneVnyd JohannisbergRiesling SantaYnezVlly TheAmbassador'sVnyd SelectedHrvst (SaH: 44 Brix; RS: 23.5%; 9.0%) 1981: Very dark brown/near black color like a PX; very intense botrytis/apricotty/rotted fruit/peach syrup nose; very sweet/syrupy tart very intense botrytis/canned apricot syrup/peachy flavor; very long/lingering syrupy/very sweet canned peach syrup/apricotty/botrytis tart slightly bitter finish; very syrupy sweet and not much complexity or development.
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A wee BloodyPulpit:
1. This wine was pretty typical of old heavily botrytis wines. The color was that of old PX and the nose & taste was intensely botrytis. The dark/black color would indicate the wine was heavily oxidized and, therefore, be reason enough for some to reject this wine because we know that oxidation is "bad" in wine...so we've been told by aurhorities.
What I'm finding in these heavily botrytis wines (be they JR, GWT, Chard, or whatever) is that the sugar acts as a tremendous preservative and, save for the dark color, keeps the wine sort of in suspended animation...they just don't develop that much complexity with age. I've got a pretty complete collection of all those original Calif BA/TBA wines (FreemarkAbbey, Phelps, Ch.StJean, Felton-Empire, etc) from the early-late '70's that I should taste together at some point, afore they or I (not very emminent) die.
This was one of the last Firestone wines made by TonyAustin afore he left Firestone. I don't think Tony gets the recognition he truly deserves for his early contributions to SantaBarbaraCnty wines. He made some very special ones during his tenure there. He know is making very good wines up at SonomaCoastVnyds near Sebastapol.
Tom