We hope you had a wonderful New Year and enjoyed all the celebrations the New Year brings! We knocked out 2014 with yet another great lineup of wines! We started with a Chardonnay that was a lean, clean, mineral-machine: a bottle of 2013 Patrick Piuze Chablis from the Grand Cru vineyard of Bougros. Rich in structure while assertive in flavors, it showed racy lime zest with its sweet lime blossom on the nose; while the palate was so focused in briny minerality, reminiscent of oyster shells and flint, that it made me hunger for fresh raw oysters and other plump, juicy, salty bivalves with my glass of Chablis.
As the evening settled in and the final hours approached, the front room became more intimate with only a small group of members enjoying one another’s company while equally, and thoroughly, enjoying a bottle of 1995 Harlan Estate Cabernet Sauvignon. It showed off its more refined characteristics in its age with comprehensive flavors of dried herbs, dried espresso, leather, and star anise. The red and black fruit was still vibrant and juicy, but more preserved than fresh and there were brilliant layers of toasty baking spices and tobacco that were more prevalent in the really long finish.
We jumped 10 years and north from Harlan’s estate and with significantly higher elevation as we opened a bottle of 2005 Bond Estate Pluribus Red blend. It was powerful and brooding with ripe black berries, rich violets, and deep licorice. Graphite, deep spice, black pepper and persistent tannins appeared on the tail end of the mid-palate and going into the finish. As its ripe fruit and alcoholic strength paved the way, it can age for a long while in the cellar before revisiting this wine.
To finish off the night after a lot of heavy hitter reds, a very rare and ‘royal wine’ was opened: a bottle of the 1996 Nyetimber Blanc de Blancs Traditional Method Brut Sparkling Wine. As England’s largest vineyard estate, the country’s first world-class sparkling wine, and the wine of the Royal Wedding, Nyetimber boasts from West Sussex where the same chalky basin of Champagne continues under the Channel to surface again in England, majestically seen in the famous Dover chalk cliffs, which is only a little over an hour and a half drive to the east. This wine has been a favorite at Graileys with its complex flavors of green pear, white flowers and lime along with notes of toasted almond, pastry dough and salinity. It was rich and full in body with creamy bubbles that lead to a toasty long finish.
The first bottles we opened of 2015 were both of late-nineties from the ‘Old’ and the ‘New’. A 1997 Conn Valley ‘Eloge’ Proprietary Red from Napa Valley, CA and a 1998 Leoville Barton from St. Julien, Bordeaux. The 1997 Conn Valley Eloge got the gold in this side by side tasting as it showed more balance and charm with its well preserved fruit, softened tannins and complex layers of leather, toasted cedar, and smoke. The ’98 Leoville Barton seemed somewhat closed this evening, with muddled black currant and plum, dried herbs, dark cocoa, and dark spice in layers not as seamless as the ’97 Eloge.
The last of 2014 and the first of 2015
NV Krug Grande Cuvee Champagne
1999 Nicolas Feuillatte ‘Palmes d’Or’ Brut Champagne
NV Vouette & Sorbee ‘Fidele’ Extra Brut Champagne
2011 Booker Vineyards ‘White’ Paso Robles Rhone Blend
2009 Arnaud Ente Meursault
1994 La Sirena Sangiovese Napa Valley
1995 Vieux Chateau Certan Pomerol
1999 Bond ‘Matriarch’ Napa Valley Bordeaux Blend
2011 Lillian ‘Gold Series No. 1’ Santa Barbara Syrah
2011 Continuum Napa Valley Proprietary Red Blend
1993 Domaine Bachelet Bourgogne Rouge
2010 Radio Coteau Savoy Chardonnay