August 2019 Purchases

[Rossco]

Just snuck this in

3 x 2014 Passopisciaro Passorosso
Apparently not the best year, but will put it down for a little while and see where it goes.

[Ozzie W]

Just snuck this in

3 x 2014 Passopisciaro Passorosso
Apparently not the best year, but will put it down for a little while and see where it goes.

A bigger version than in other better vintages with the ABV at 15% (usually 14%) and a tad less balanced. I still think it'll age a treat. Keep a bottle until at least 2024 if you want to see what aged Nerello is all about. Good producers still make good wines in lesser vintages.

There's still some (current for Australia) 2016 vintage readily available retail, including from our gracious host. 2016 the best vintage since the outstanding 2011 vintage.

[Rossco]

Just snuck this in

3 x 2014 Passopisciaro Passorosso
Apparently not the best year, but will put it down for a little while and see where it goes.

A bigger version than in other better vintages with the ABV at 15% (usually 14%) and a tad less balanced. I still think it'll age a treat. Keep a bottle until at least 2024 if you want to see what aged Nerello is all about. Good producers still make good wines in lesser vintages.

There's still some (current for Australia) 2016 vintage readily available retail, including from our gracious host. 2016 the best vintage since the outstanding 2011 vintage.

You are the best Oz, thanks. Really would be good if it held out longer (say 2032 - birth year) but will crack one 2024 and see where its at.

Will have a hunt for the 2016, cheers!

Pity 2012 wasnt a great one...... oh well

[Ozzie W]

Just snuck this in

3 x 2014 Passopisciaro Passorosso
Apparently not the best year, but will put it down for a little while and see where it goes.

A bigger version than in other better vintages with the ABV at 15% (usually 14%) and a tad less balanced. I still think it'll age a treat. Keep a bottle until at least 2024 if you want to see what aged Nerello is all about. Good producers still make good wines in lesser vintages.

There's still some (current for Australia) 2016 vintage readily available retail, including from our gracious host. 2016 the best vintage since the outstanding 2011 vintage.

You are the best Oz, thanks. Really would be good if it held out longer (say 2032 - birth year) but will crack one 2024 and see where its at.

Will have a hunt for the 2016, cheers!

Pity 2012 wasnt a great one...... oh well

I did say "at least" 2024. It'll certainly go longer. I find that at around a decade they start to get tertiary characteristics. GW at TWF has a drinking window of 2019 to 2034, so cork permitting 2032 is a realistic objective to open for an 18th birthday. We really don't know the true aging ability of Nerello as they haven't been around for long enough (in modern form). I've had the 2007 vintage twice this year (Passopisciaro and Calabretta). 2007 was a great vintage and both were still going very strong.

[Mahmoud Ali]

Just snuck this in

3 x 2014 Passopisciaro Passorosso
Apparently not the best year, but will put it down for a little while and see where it goes.

Oddly enough I have read the opposite, that 2014 was an excellent vintage. In a review of Pietradolce's Archineri Etna Rosso 2014, the reviewer referred to 2014 as "a perfect year in Etna".

With regard to the 2014 Passopisciaro Passorosso, I wouldn't worry. Here are a couple of reviews I've read with emphasis being mine.

A US wine retailer quoted this review from Antonio Galloni's Vinous:

"Bright red-ruby. The captivating nose combines strawberry, raspberry, minerals, violet and flint aromas. Creamy-sweet but amazingly light on its feet, offering palate-staining, perfumed flavors of soft red berries, ripe red cherry, vanilla, aromatic herbs and crushed rock. Rich, ripe and suave, but displays a penetrating, saline and energetic quality that gives this beauty a three-dimensional mouthfeel and a light-on-its-feet quality. Finishes with great length and wonderfully polished tannins. Absolute knockout wine: from a memorable vintage on Etna, this is most likely the best Passorosso ever (in earlier vintages, it used to be called simply Passopisciaro). Mainly Nerello Mascalese. (Ian D'Agata) (12/2016)" 97 points Vinous

A staff member of the retailer said this:

2014 was an outstanding vintage on Mount Etna perhaps less glorious in the rest of Italy but sensational for the Etna Rosso DOC. Passopisciaro Passorosso is a stunning wine the nose is full of smoke, wild cherry, leather, spice and gives you the sensation of having a lot more to give I couldn’t describe everything, it’s just overflowing. On the palate this wine makes a very bold statement, it fills your mouth with a luscious density that is a new dimension for Etna Rosso, so much richer than most. The flavors are saturated; waves of sweet, plumy/cherry fruit followed by flows of smoke, herb and leather then more fruit and again more fruit. This is a fairly high alcohol wine 15.5% but it isn’t out of balance, it’s very rich but it never loses its poise and focus. A truly outstanding wine!

I wouldn't worry about the 2014 vintage if i were you.
With the Passopisciaro Passorosso you seem to have a winner on your hands Rossco!

[Mahmoud Ali]

Speaking of Sicilian wines, I just bought the 2015 Le Casematte 'Peloro', a Faro wine that is made from Nerello Mascalese (70%) and Nocera (30%). With this blend of grapes I trust that it will resemble an Etna wine. Faro is the smallest DOC in Italy and Le Casematte own almost half of it. It is an IGT wine and not DOC Faro because it doesn't contain Nerello Cappucio. I am really pleased that the wine is only 13% but cannot be absolutely positive because the back label of my 750 ml bottle also says 1,5 LT. Ha, ha, were it only so!

Mahmoud.

[Rossco]

I wouldn't worry about the 2014 vintage if i were you.
With the Passopisciaro Passorosso you seem to have a winner on your hands Rossco!

LOL Thanks Mahmoud, although 15.5% is a big wine

[Ozzie W]

Speaking of Sicilian wines, I just bought the 2015 Le Casematte 'Peloro', a Faro wine that is made from Nerello Mascalese (70%) and Nocera (30%). With this blend of grapes I trust that it will resemble an Etna wine. Faro is the smallest DOC in Italy and Le Casematte own almost half of it. It is an IGT wine and not DOC Faro because it doesn't contain Nerello Cappucio. I am really pleased that the wine is only 13% but cannot be absolutely positive because the back label of my 750 ml bottle also says 1,5 LT. Ha, ha, were it only so!

Mahmoud.

Good find! I like this producer. They also make a Faro DOC wine which has Nerello Mascale 55%; Nerello Cappuccio 25; Nocera 10%; Nero d’avola 10%.

I've only tried 2013 and 2014 vintages of both labels. 2013 tasted similar to Etna. 2014 felt like a different interpretation of Nerello. Please report back on your 2015 once you've tried it.

[kenzo]

Coincidentally I just finished a bottle of Tenuta della Terre Nere Etna Rosso 2017. Whilst a lighter body than the wines I have been drinking lately, this didn't disappoint, and I will seek out some of their other bottlings. Red fruit, strawberry evolving to cherry and tart raspberry with a hint of minerality. Superb balance of fruit, acidity, and tannin here, and the palate evolves with air to keep interest. Would love to try this with a bit of age on it. Yum!

[Gavin Trott]

Coincidentally I just finished a bottle of Tenuta della Terre Nere Etna Rosso 2017. Whilst a lighter body than the wines I have been drinking lately, this didn't disappoint, and I will seek out some of their other bottlings. Red fruit, strawberry evolving to cherry and tart raspberry with a hint of minerality. Superb balance of fruit, acidity, and tannin here, and the palate evolves with air to keep interest. Would love to try this with a bit of age on it. Yum!

Interesting, as I am just about to get all the new releases of the Tenuta Terre Nere Etna wines in, as now available to me for sale.

Great to hear about the quality, as I've not yet tried them myself.

.

[Ozzie W]

6 x 2018 Hoddles Creek Pinot Noir 1er
(pre-release to mailing list)

[Ozzie W]

Just when you think you're done, along comes another offer.

3 x 2019 Ravensworth Riesling Ancestral

[rosewaterwrx]

1 x Tyrrell's Old Patch 2018
1 x Tyrrell's 4 Acres 2018
3 x Mt Pleasant 1946 - 2018
3 x Mt Pleasant Mountain C 2018
2 x Mt Pleasant Mountain A 2018
1 x Mountain D 2018
2 x Mt Pleasant OPOH - 2018
1 x Keller Limestone Riesling 2017
2 x Luke Lambert Rose 2017
2 x Luke Lambert Crudo Shiraz 2017
1 x Houghton Gladstone Cab 2010
2 x La Ca Nova Montefico 2015
3 x L'Enclos De Tertre Riesling 2017
2 x Ravensworth Shiraz Viogner 2017

Ok wine buying must end for a while and am sending a couple of boxes to auction to justify this months spend

[kenzo]

2 x 2009 Ridge Lytton Springs
2 x 2009 Ridge Geyserville
1 x 2013 Haut-Blanville Clos des Legendes

[Mahmoud Ali]

3 x Mt Pleasant 1946 - 2018
3 x Mt Pleasant Mountain C 2018
2 x Mt Pleasant Mountain A 2018
1 x Mountain D 2018
2 x Mt Pleasant OPOH - 2018

Goodness, what posers, Mountain A, Mountain B, and Mountain D, not to mention 1946? A good way to part good money from wine buyers. Yeesh!

Mahmoud.

[Ozzie W]

3 x Mt Pleasant 1946 - 2018
3 x Mt Pleasant Mountain C 2018
2 x Mt Pleasant Mountain A 2018
1 x Mountain D 2018
2 x Mt Pleasant OPOH - 2018

Goodness, what posers, Mountain A, Mountain B, and Mountain D, not to mention 1946? A good way to part good money from wine buyers. Yeesh!

Mahmoud.

They're outstanding wines. Priced less than many producers charge for their premium wines. If you're into Hunter Valley shiraz, I don't see the issue.

[rosewaterwrx]

3 x Mt Pleasant 1946 - 2018
3 x Mt Pleasant Mountain C 2018
2 x Mt Pleasant Mountain A 2018
1 x Mountain D 2018
2 x Mt Pleasant OPOH - 2018

Goodness, what posers, Mountain A, Mountain B, and Mountain D, not to mention 1946? A good way to part good money from wine buyers. Yeesh!

Mahmoud.

I'm curious to know what you are referring to Mahmoud. Posers?? The winery or me?....I mean Moi??
Utterly outstanding wines the lot of them and priced fairly to very sharply I'd say based on tasting the 14 and 17 vintages. 2014 Mountain C gave me far more drinking pleasure than any Penfolds red I've had including many vintages of Grange, St Henri and 389.

[Mahmoud Ali]

Goodness, what posers, Mountain A, Mountain B, and Mountain D, not to mention 1946? A good way to part good money from wine buyers. Yeesh!

I'm curious to know what you are referring to Mahmoud. Posers?? The winery or me?....I mean Moi??

Perhaps I used the wrong word, and of course I was referring to the winery and not you. I've no doubt that they might be good wines but what I was trying to get at was the multiplicity of wines seems pretentious to me. How many different shiraz wines are they going to make using basically the same vineyard sources. I presume they are still making the O'Shea, Rosehill, and OP and OH wines but have used the same vineyard resources to make the Mountain and Vine Age wines, thereby reducing the quantity of bottles and fueling prices.

I didn't mean to berate the wines, not at all. I was just expressing my feelings about the seeming pretentiousness of trying to convince people that there is merit in making so many different shirazes from presumably the same vineyards. Hopefully they won't introduce Mountain B 'Upper Slope' and 'Lower Slope' wines, or Rosehill 'Row 1-15' and 'Row 16-32' Shiraz.

Sorry for the confusion, and by no means did I mean to say that the wines aren't good. The must be if they come from the same vineyards as the original standard bearers.

Mahmoud.

[Ian S]

Oh man!

Do NOT give them ideas for yet more premium brands

[mjs]

6 x 2013 Claredon Hills Hickinbotham Cabernet
6 x 2018 Hoddles Ck 1er Pinot (Ozzie note this!)
12 x 2017 Leconfield Cabernet (at a very sharp $17/b)
12 x 2016 Seppelt Chalambar

[Ozzie W]

6 x 2018 Hoddles Ck 1er Pinot (Ozzie note this!)

Who are you, and what have you done with mjs?

[mjs]

6 x 2018 Hoddles Ck 1er Pinot (Ozzie note this!)

Who are you, and what have you done with mjs?

[Rossco]

6 x 2018 Hoddles Ck 1er Pinot (Ozzie note this!)

Surely you bought this for someone else mjs

[mjs]

6 x 2018 Hoddles Ck 1er Pinot (Ozzie note this!)

Surely you bought this for someone else mjs

As surprising as it might seem, I have bought Hoddles Creek in the past
We had a Maralinga Wine Society tasting with Franco at the winery back in a July, which was really good, he’s doing some great stuff, so had to pull the trigger when the email came out a few days ago.

[mychurch]

Picked up a couple of bottles of Chambers Grand Muscat tonight. Was actually in Dans to get some beer and noticed these half bottles for $26. Seemed a good deal, even if it’s nit a style I drink a lot of any more. Might make a very luxurious ice cream topper.