Bokisch Vineyards Graciano 2005

Type: Red
Producer: Bokisch Vineyards
Variety: Graciano
Country USA
Region California
SubRegion Central Valley
Appellation Lodi
Alc. 14.5%
$25.99 from WineQ



The Little Wooden Guy appreciates wines made to drink fresh, rather than cellar.

Night One

A rich earthy smell first out of the bottle changes slowly to more fruit and spice after an hour or so in the glass. Red cherries and wild strawberries, asian spices and a touch of vanilla all overlay faint earth and mild mushrooms.

Curiously, red fruit on the nose turns to darker fruit on the palate, blackberries and blackcurrants along with unsweetened cranberries. The darker fruit fades on the mid-palate as a bit of underlying earth joins the tart, even slightly bitter, cranberries. It all leads to a mid-length richly tannic finish.

Very nice on Night One. Will it get better, or fall off, tomorrow?

Night Two

Fruits are darker and softer on Night Two. The cherries have gone from bright Bing cherries to riper black cherries. The tart strawberries are gone, replaced by sweet blueberries and mulberries. The spice is mostly gone, too. The vanilla still lingers.

Most of the balance is gone, leaving a vanilla-loaded wooden fruit bomb, adding cloying brown sugar in the mid-palate and an overall sense of over-worked sweetness.

This was a very nice bottle of wine on Night One, and a big disappointment on Night Two. Does that mean it's bad? No, not at all. It means it is a good bottle of wine made to drink fresh, not to decant for hours or cellar for years.