(In the sequence I tasted them the first time through…)
Once again I return to the unknowable, and what (if any) place it has in a literature of tasting. I like leaving my notes as I took them, and because of that you will see that I was relatively cool toward the range of Spätburgunders, until they’d been open a few days, at which point a prevalent youthful spikiness vanished, leaving one suave juicy wine after another, yet with all their terroir angularity intact. As I’m writing these words, I have “tasted” all of them once and drank many of them in the kitchen either during prep or with the eventual meal.
The white wines were consistently excellent and remained so over nearly a week, until the final drops were poured. The reds squirmed around; some zigged, some zagged, some did both. In general they found a sweet almost sappy fruit after about three days – except for the wine that was fruitiest to start with: the Forstberg GG, which closed down and became temperamental.
That wines change with time and air is a commonplace. That “scores” given on what is often a fallacious first impression is thus a travesty. And yet, the practical impact of these things for the drinker is debatable. Other than writing “decanting recommended,” what does a writer do if he wishes to be both truthful and helpful? My provisional solution – provisional because I haven’t really concluded anything at this point – is to tell the story, make such inferences as are plausible, and hope you find it interesting.
So please note, before you read my somewhat faint praises of these reds, that they tended to grow in loveliness each time I retasted them, and I’ll try to reflect that in my texts.