weekend wines, week 1 2019

9.1.2019billn

1996 Guy Castagnier, Clos St.Denis
A cork that broke into many pieces – just about recoverable
My last one of this stinked – brett amongst other things – this was way better! A smooth and pure dark-red fruit on the nose – in fact just that – a nice line and shape, but primary – at 22 years old! The palate was reasonably concentrated, nicely silky but like the nose – oh-so young. Given the forward but still balanced acidity I’m not sure what vintage I may have guessed – still a bit sharp for 2005 – but equivalently young. No maturity here – but delicious – all was drunk the same night. And it was a stable wine too – no bretty development – the last sip was as good as the first.
Rebuy – Yes

Now you mention 2005s…

2005 Bertagna, Chambolle-Musigny Le Village
Another terrible – broken in the middle cork – at this level of annoyance, I’d prefer DIAM! Not recoverable either, even with an Ah-So, it ended up in the neck so I quickly decanted through a filter.
Well, what do you know – more depth and certainly more aromatic complexity – perhaps even maturity – than the 1996. Go figure. It’s a dark complexity that is visible in the flavours too – perhaps a little oak-derived. But a wine with more volume and more maturity than the CSD, complex though less finely textured. A great and cushioned wine for the label – Chambolle has always been my sweet spot for 2005s. Great Villages! Another wine that didn’t last the night (but not the same night!)
Rebuy – Yes

Leave a Reply to Siddharth DasguptaCancel reply

There are 2 responses to “weekend wines, week 1 2019”

  1. goughie139th January 2019 at 9:16 pmPermalinkReply

    Can fully empathise with the cork issues Bill. Before the current self imposed ‘dry’ January one of the last wines opened was a G Barthod ’96 Chambolle 1er Aux Beaux Bruns. Absolutely shockingly poor cork broke about half way without any great pressure during slow extraction. Fortunately managed to extract the bottom section from the bottle neck fairly easily. As a counterpoint the very last wine recently opened, C Tremblay’s ’09 BR Croix Blanche, had just about the most superb cork I can recall seeing in a very long time – tight, super smooth, blemish free, just wet/coloured a little at the bottom. Was so good at first thought it wasn’t a real cork – but it was. Hey ho 🙂

    • billn10th January 2019 at 8:37 pmPermalinkReply

      The problem is that once you have broken the cork – very often (not always) trying to push something more in, usually just dislodges the remaining cork into the neck, or is alternatively useless if you have actually made a hole in the middle of the remaining part. It might work in half the cases of broken corks though…

      • Siddharth Dasgupta10th January 2019 at 8:40 pmPermalinkReply

        I mean if this pressure pump is used from the beginning – not when part of the cork is broken.
        since it applies pressure uniformly to the bottom of the cork, in principle, all of it should come out intact.

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