Component Wine
Château de la Font du Loup
Châteauneuf-du-Pape Red Rhone Blend 2016
Intensely packed black fruits, ripe and soaked, pushing hedonistic but maintaining that fresh snap. Classic 2016. Very stoney, warm earth abound, a true sense of CNDP minerality here. I think the Mourvèdre component really shines through here, love the animal, fur, herbs and deep resounding tannin from it. Drank over two nights and it barely moved an inch, this will continue to age beautifully. — 5 years ago
Clos Erasmus
Laurel Priorat Garnacha Blend 2005
Gorgeous. Resolved, long, packed with luscious fruit character supported by sweet oak, minerals, earth, flowers and spices. Roasted black plum, crushed black currants, berry confiture, sandalwood, allspice, cardamom, bay leaf, spruce, cigar wrapper, menthol, pulverized rock, cigar ash, truffle, lilacs, dry aged meat. Can really pick out the Cabernet component, which I’m usually against but I believe the time in bottle brought harmony to it. The dimension it brings suits the wine well. Great example of alluring DMS with its earthy/truffle notes. — 6 years ago
Poggio il Castellare
Brunello di Montalcino Sangiovese 2005
@Plate & Bottle Summer Dinner.
Main Course, Beef Skirt Steak, Roasted Tomato, Artichoke, Potato Mousseline. Steak has mash potato, roasted tomato relish, lemony artichoke purée with a smokey component.
Hedy is an amazingly, creative Chef.
Superb food & the wine pairing doesn’t suck as a friend of mine is famous for saying.
Photos of the evening at our friends Jeff & Hedy.
— 7 years ago
Broc Cellars
Lone Pine Vineyard El Dorado Lagrein 2017
Much better than last year. Ripe strawberries, rose, it has a kind of lemony acid, and then a great herbal component. It’s almost like concentrated strawberry lemonade with a wood component that’s really nice not at all like oak. — 7 years ago
Domaine de la Grange des Pères
Vin de Pays de l'Hérault Red Rhone Blend 2006
Initially this is a funky, sweaty and a touch oxidized even though it was decanted. After about an hour nose is brighter with cassis, red raspberry and black cherry fruit. There are nice spice, dried herb and mineral elements that accent the fruit. Palate always stays a little rustic with the Cabernet component holding sway with the coarse tannic palate. Fruit is black cherry with both red and black current notes. Good length on the finish. Even after 3 hours, the wine remains slightly rustic, coarse and missing the hedonistic edge I often find in this wine. Based on this bottle, fully ready to drink. — 4 years ago
Component Wine
Sémillon 2017
A few fun bottles from last Friday.
I got to taste through the Component lineup with the owner a few months back, and enjoyed each wine, as well as the unique idea behind Component’s approach to how they make wine. On its own, this is a solid semillon and varietally correct, though I’m not there on the price tag. Herbal and floral on the nose with a lush and rounded profile showing notes of lemon oil, grapefruit, sea salt and dried mango. Not much acidity here. — 6 years ago
Château Latour
Premier Grand Cru Classé Pauillac Red Bordeaux Blend 1993
Mineral component and cassis coming through and setting table for woody and earthy aromas. Mouth offers density and polished tanins. Good length with fruit echoing in retro. — 7 years ago
Silver Oak
Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon 2011
2011 in a nice place. Very soft, with classic lucious wood component. Showing a typical Napa darkness without the density. Proud of how it shows the vintage. — 8 years ago
Paul Lato
Cinematique Larner Vineyard Syrah 2011
Terrific syrah from Paul Lato. Seriously closed at first - and an earthy component makes you think that it might be showing a hint of cork - but the wine evolves in the glass over the course of an hour or so to reveal amazing, deep aromatics of blackberries, iodine, and wood-roasted meats. Palate is super primary, suggesting that this wine needs either 2-3 hours of decanting or another 3-4 years in the cellar. A terrific offering from Mr. Lato that is only going to improve over time! — 9 years ago
Krug
Brut Rosé Champagne Blend
Comprised around the 2011 harvest, it sports its usual candied, floral and spice inflicted bouquet but also showing an excellent balance of mineral and complex earth component on this occasion. Always a treat! — 3 years ago
Frédéric Magnien
Coeur de Roches Meursault Chardonnay 2019
2019 vintage. Obvs super youthful and that translates here to a large, super fresh lime component. Better than good mineral presence. The crisper side of Meursault. — 3 years ago
Château La Conseillante
Pomerol Red Bordeaux Blend 2018
The 2018 La Conseillante was given a two-hour decant and then monitored over the following 12 hours. What a stupendous Pomerol! It has a bravura nose that immediately seduces the olfactory senses, delivering a cornucopia of black cherries, cassis, crushed violets and iris. Such intensity here, and then it blossoms, accentuating its floral component while retaining the DNA of Pomerol. The palate is exquisitely balanced with fine tannins that frame the pure black cherry and strawberry fruit. But it is the texture and the harmony of this La Conseillante that knocks you sideways, that tertiary finish that I noticed out of barrel gone, replaced by satin-textured, almost citrus-fresh fruit. Marielle Cazaux and her team have overseen a brilliant La Conseillante. (Neal Martin, Vinous, March 2021)
— 5 years ago
Il Borro
Toscana Red Blend 2015
Fantastic and reasonably priced, rich and big-bodied Tuscan. Lots of wood and beef blood with a jammy component. Compelling nose of brambly dark red fruit. Leather all about, which shouldn’t surprise anyone in a wine made by Ferragamo... I’d give this a year or two to sort out, score likely to improve. Cipriani @ Wynn LV (which Foursquare couldn’t find, I hate that app) — 7 years ago
Domaine Saint Préfert
Clos Beatus Ille Côtes du Rhône Grenache Blend 2017
This captures the style of Saint Préfert quiet well with its sleek profile, freshness and lifted aromatics. This has some serious class for its CDR origin, very pure and elegantly structured. Fresh to overripe black fruit, stones, candied olive, smoke and lavender. There’s a hint of meaty-ness as well. The florals are this wines most intriguing component, coupled with the snap of acid the blend has, tremendous value. 85 GR 15 CI, “la Lionne” in Sorgues, gallets soils, full concrete — 7 years ago
Château Pontet-Canet
Pauillac Red Bordeaux Blend 2000
Dark and punchy, inky fruit. Quite cool blooded, with a sour component and graphite. A long life ahead of it. Delicious. — 8 years ago
R. López de Heredia
Viña Tondonia Reserva Rioja Tempranillo Blend 2005
Hints of balsamic reduction and tea leaves on the nose. Beautiful crimson red in the glass from middle to rim with faint brown edges. Medium tannins and acidity. Black tea, espresso grounds, unripened plum skins and a tomato jam component on the finish. Oak is moderate and well integrated. Tannins hang in there through the finish. Paired with meatloaf...whatever bro. Eat what you got, when you can, when you work in retail. — 9 years ago
Lyn Farmer
A blend of the five Bordeaux varietals, this is an exceptional wine. There’s a great balance of acidity, velvet tannins and black fruit. Cassis, black cherry, black plum, a light toast and vanilla oak component and developing tertiary character of leather, forest floor and cigar box. Terrifically harmonious the wine is full bodied with a sense of being heavy. A joy to consume. — a year ago