In a predominantly French folly of bottles at the table, the Immortal was clearly the Yankee gym rat trying to push its way through the patiently waiting line at the local Parisian jazz club. Huge,…
I've written quite a bit on this wine. It was a little misplaced in the spattering of wines at the table; so for that, it suffered a bit. That said, it did pair extraordinarily well with pork in wine…
Smooth and slightly round on first entry, with the contours of the 2012 vintage showing a suave plane of velvety and flowing red and black fruit flavors. With blackberry, black cherry, saturated…
If you had told me this was a 2005, I'd say you were a couple cans short of a six pack. I would've called this thing as ten years younger easy. I know that SQNs typically need more time than I…
More accessible and blacker fruited than its 2013 sibling served next to it, the 2015 is still just as medium-bodied but offers more mouth-watering fruit, with less of the 2013's green elements…
A biiiiiiig daddy, the M7 is the most powerful and bicep-driven of all the 40+ wines served up over the course of three days. Having come off a tasting where the 2016 M7 was the belle of the ball in…
Grippy blackberry, with healthy doses of green peppercorns, bark, menthol, and pyrazine elements make for a profile that is fairly strict and taut. There is a bitter tinge that carries through the…
Rich without being rich, day one of this wine was fairly plush, pumping full throttled black fruit and chocolate notes out like a firehose. A baby Vice Versa M7, the Lail was unsurprisingly showing…
Tannic and drying, the chest on this thing is bumping and thumping with push, thrust, grip and clutch, but the fruit has a difficult time elbowing past the bro-code bullishness of the frame. Black…
The roots (literally) and history of this wine are indeed an interesting lineage to follow insofar as the To Kalon fruit and the MacDonald connection. For that, I am forever appreciative to have…
Huge blackberry cobbler, camphor, brush, and booze. It has the hallmarks of the SQN Syrah flavor profile that I love, but like all things SQN, I recommend at least another 7+ years (more like 10)…
With dark berry, earth, and a bit of sherrying (already?) permeating the profile, the 2001 Harlan is all class. Muddled black cherry, dry cinnamon stick, leather, and menagerie of tertiary elements,…
Not dissimilar to the 2020 Distenta II Syrah served beside it, this year-older sibling is even more megabomb boom in its delivery. The 2019 is more busting out the seams with just pure black and blue…
On day one, this was a blacker fruit and mineral dominated beast. I was loving it, but I was even more enamored with it on the second day, where the body really filled out and notes of earth,…
A perfect wine, and perhaps the best wine of the weekend. Black fruit profile (my favorite!), with dark spice, and black rock, black soil, black roses?!, black-black whatevers, bitter black…
As much as I have championed Ultramarine as a unique alternative to Champagne (In reality, they really couldn't be further apart in many ways, but that's not necessarily a bad thing), I unfortunately…
Initially angular (surprisingly for a Colgin) and displaying some heat and bite, luckily this IX doesn't take long before it settles into a more comfortable glide. Tertiary flavors of leather,…
There were a couple of Auberts in the tasting that I inadvertently dodged and for whatever reason was unable to conjure up the logistical prowess to get to them and proffer some sort of comparison…
Restrained blackberry seed, dried thyme, black cherry, and river rocks, the Lore shares characteristics similar to a 2016 Shafer HSS served beside it, but for the profile of the Lore being more…
Plum, black cherry, and the sweat of a Vegas nightclubber, the 2014 Cariad offers a little rave succulence and opulence with a little parental shoulder angel sternness. More former than the latter,…
My preference in the world of Ultramarine tends to gravitate toward their BdBs, though the Rose can be a fantastic alternative to bubblies across the Atlantic. In fact, this BdB was served next to…
Red and black fruits present as ripe and succulently semi-sweet at the onset. The first sip is kinda like gulping a bowl of the rainbow milk left in the bowl after you just wolf down a solid helping…
Disgorged 11/15/2022. My notes from last year pretty much sum up my experience this go-around (12/15/2022). This bottle showed yeastier elements than the seemingly drier and more cut bottle from six…
Saturating, juicy, delectable, and all the superlatives you can conjure up to describe what is indeed the most giving of the bunch. Heightened complexity is temporarily on hold during the initial…
Though the oak here is perceptible, it does not show as aggressively as Harlan on the initial pull of the cork. Earth, eucalyptus (or is it bay leaf?... or is it mint??), grippy unripe blackberry and…
