Notes from a small group blind tasting dinner of Rhone Wines
1993 Château de Beaucastel CNduP Blanc Cuvée Roussanne Vieilles Vignes – I’ve been slowly working my way through this unusual wine for the last 20 years or so. The wine is now a dark clear apricot colour and the nose showed a nice waxiness melded with a hint of petrol initially and it developed some ripe figgy flavours with hints of dried apricot, and a long finish and excellent balance. Not even a hint of oxidation.
1989 Château de Beaucastel CNduP – I thought I’d open this as the first red. I’ve tasted oxidized over the hill bottles from other cellars but have never experienced that in mine and although in youth there was a fair bit of funkiness to the wine, that seems to have all resolved now. It is a medium red with bricky orange edges, and there was slight funk in the nose, with an initial hint of menthol that dissipated early one, so that it settled into a dark fruit nose with spicy hints. In the mouth it showed an almost youthful berry nature and was well balanced and bright, with a very long, elegant finish. I think that this was the best showing I’ve seen yet from this wine.
1998 Vieux Donjon CNduP – I tasted this wine on realease and as blown away by it, and instantly bought two cases to stash until it hit plateau. Now, 15 or so years later, the wine is singing! Spicy peppery nose with smoky hints and underlying cassis. In the mouth, the wine bloomed with black cherry and anise notes and is lively on palate and had commendable length. Very good.
1999 Charbonniere CNduP – hadn’t tasted this in a long time. Good colour, medium rip nose with garrigue and red fruit and a nice smooth medium length finish. Pleasant if a tad ripe.
2003 Caves de Tain Crozes Hermitage Les Hauts de Fiefs – the product of a large co-op but producing quality wines. This one showed fair depth of colour and white pepper and meat in the nose medium length and very decent, with soft tannin.
2003 Vieux Telegraphe CNduP – fairly funky nose but smooth on palate, ripe but not to the point of being jammy, showing medium length and a fairly full resolution of structure. Nice now, not a top vintage for VT, and likely won’t get any better from this point. Should hold awhile though.
1993 Château de la Tuilerie Muscat de Rivesaltes – thought I’d finish more or less in theme (this winery is in Nimes) with this Muscat, which I believe is no longer made. In fact the proprietor, Chantal Comte apparently spends her time on exotic Caribbean Rums these days… This wine was a medium amber colour tending to orange and had a classic muscat nose. Someone else suggested that it developed a Sichuan pepper element as it opened and they were quite right! Sweet but well balanced with plenty of acidity and quite a long finish. It’s like being plunged into sweet muscat and then just before it has a chance to be cloying, you get a shot of cleansing acidity. Too bad I hadn’t bought more of this modestly priced wine way back when I could have.