There’s plenty of hoopla now about ‘His Parkerness’ suing his former #1 son – it seems the disintegration of an old and relatively trusted brand; yet with new Asian ownership and a business plan (I assume they have a business plan!) that must have a strong focus towards the largely untapped Asian consumer, it probably matters not a jot to the management team. Of-course for armchair commentators it is the thing of dreams 😉
Over the last years, however, I think that CellarTracker has become a much more valuable tool when it comes to ‘what to drink?’ – as opposed to ‘what to buy?’. For example I considered I might like to open a bottle of Rousseau Chambertin this week, and given that I have a little more of the ’98, I thought that might be the one. I quickly checked CellarTracker and found 28 notes on that wine, the most recent:
All black fruit with modest spice, mostly new oak, and a meaty character.
Let’s forget that the taster giver it 94 points, more important to me was the oak reference. I get bored with commenting on oak in wines, so this note sealed it – the wine can wait in the cellar for a few more years. Thanks CellarTracker.
It doesn’t help me wading through the cases to choose a replacement though!
There is one response to “kudos to cellar-tracker…”
That’s interesting Bill. Do you think there is a point where oak adds something to the overall pleasure though. I recently had one of the Chanterives BB 2010. My first thought on tasting was I was impressed by the oak management, and it added to the pleasure of drinking the wine. That being said I remember my first purchases of GCVV 00 and 03 of Dugat Py and hated the fact that I was chewing through the wood to get to the fruit.
Oak is a necessary part and parcel of trying to make great wine that ages. There have even been young wines where I’ve actually enjoyed the oaky aspects – I remember Pascal Marchand’s Corton – but essentially, I see obvious oak character as too heavily applied make-up. It’s too obvious and distracting – I’d rather wait for it to be something in the background, particularly when I want to taste/drink great wine…