Twitter Taste Live- The 89 Project

This review is just of Night Two from the weekend's Twitter Taste Live, sponsored by The 89 Project. For Night One with all the Wine Twitters, watch the video, courtesy of 1 Wide Dude:

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The Wooden Guys had a good time, but the consensus was that the Rivola was not in the same league as the rest of the wines.

2007 Jean-Marc Brocard Chablis Domaine Sainte Claire Vieilles Vignes

Type White
Producer Jean-Marc Brocard
Variety Chardonnay
Designation Vieilles Vignes
Vineyard Domaine Sainte Claire
Country France
Region Burgundy
SubRegion Chablis
Appellation Chablis

Night Two

The nose has tart apple, lime, and some minerality. From Night One to Night Two this lost a lot of fruit on the palate. It is tart and stony. There is some apple there, but it is the tart and green. Butter makes an appearance at the very end of the mid-palate and echoes lightly on the finish.

2005 Abadia Retuerta Vino de la Tierra Castilla y León Rívola

Type Red
Producer Abadia Retuerta
Variety Tempranillo Blend
Designation Rívola
Vineyard n/a
Country Spain
Region Castilla y León
SubRegion Sardon de Duero
Appellation Vino de la Tierra Castilla y León

Night Two

Oak-city on roller skates. Oh wait a second, there's a single teaspoon of blackcurrant jelly there. Unfortunately, it was crushed when the lighting struck and felled the oak tree. The lighting gave it that toasty smell.

Okay, let's take a sip, shall we? Blackberries, lots of blackberries, some cedar, and lots of vanilla. It devolves into a brown sugar/vanilla mess. The finish is short and sudden.

Honestly, I have no idea how anybody ever rated this 89.

2006 Clos La Coutale Cahors

Type Red
Producer Clos La Coutale
Variety Malbec Blend
Designation n/a
Vineyard n/a
Country France
Region Southwest France
SubRegion n/a
Appellation Cahors

Night Two

The nose has nutty, meaty smells underlying some dark fruit. Hiding behind it is a small hint of cherry, probably from the little bit of Merlot blended in. On the palate, black fruit dominates, but there is a lot more there. There is a meaty flavor like a crisp end-piece of prime rib, beefy and smoky. There is also a bit of vegetal taste, tobacco, like whole leaves hanging in a cigar shop on Calle Ocho. Tannins and acid are well balanced and pronounced, suggesting some more cellar time might be possible. Tannins are not quite smooth. "Dusty" would be a better description.

2006 Kilikanoon Shiraz The Lackey

Type Red
Producer Kilikanoon
Variety Shiraz
Designation The Lackey
Vineyard n/a
Country Australia
Region South Australia

Night Two

Bright red fruit, plums, spices, pepper and a touch of cedar all are on the nose. The palate has dark fruit, pepper, and some meatiness. At first, it was reminiscent of bacon, but a better comparison is actually Bresaola, Italian dried beef. It has the same nutty cured dried meaty flavor, especially at the back side-edges of the tongue. Tannins are smooth and sweet. Finish is long. This is nice, quite nice.

Domaine Séguinot-Bordet Chablis 2003

Chablis
Vieilles Vignes
12.5% alcohol
$21.98

From the bottle notes:

Chablis located in north burgundy, produces exclusively dry white wine, from Chardonnay grapes. These wines exhibit aromas of flint and very fleshy, fruity flavors.

You can drink this wine with seafood, and white meats. Best served at about 54 degrees.

The wine flashes in the glass, a bright clear pale yellow. Aromas start with lemon and something special, first ginger snaps and then banana cream, without losing the underlying citrus. The palate comes with several layers, too, opening with lime zest, starfruit and minerals, then sweetening to that same banana cream, followed by lime, chalk and walnuts. This is medium bodies witha long finish.

Three hours later the wine had changed some, the nose still had soft rich banana cream, but lime and ginger snaps were replaced with pineapple and starfruit. The palate was a bit different, too, with lemon zest and lime zest, some starfruit and bananas.

It should be interesting to see how this evolves overnight.

SECOND NIGHT

UGH! FUNK!! No, really, FUNK! This slept in the fridge overnight and woke up smelling like sour milk (and no, there is not any bad milk in there). The first whiff was all spoiled milk. That faded to a butter smell mixed with pineapple, evolving slowly to add a light sprinkling of lime zest and some minerals. Drinking it was another story. It opened with lemon zest and something I had to reach way back into memory to identify, zweiback, followed by a soft banana skin a mineral melange. Sharp acidity and freshness were what you look for in a chardonnay. However, out of the fridge this was just too cold to do it justice.

Two hours later it was cool, not cold, but had not changed considerably. The funk was gone, but lime zest remained on the nose, along with buttered toast and banana. Up front and midpalate the temperature change meant almost nothing, still bringing banana peel and lime zest, then acidic minerality, but the finish lengthened, adding long-lingering kumquat and grapefruit.

The wine had good body throughout, from the long-legged swirl in the glass to the mouth-coating finish. The only problem was the initial funk on the second night, but that disappeared after some open time and a warm up from the fridge.