2005 Rolf Binder/Veritas Halliwell

Cross-posted from 2 Days per Bottle. This wine received an "89" from Harvey Steinman at Wine Spectator. He said:

Bright and juicy, with lively acidity to balance the fresh berry and spice flavors, which linger effectively on the generous finish. Drink now through 2009. 3,000 cases imported. Score: 89. —Harvey Steiman, October 15, 2006.

Curiously, Robert Parker gave it a "92":

Wine Advocate- A sexy, knock-out effort for drinking over the next 5-7 years is the 2005 Shiraz/Grenache Halliwell. This aromatic blend of 60% Shiraz and 40% Grenache offers up notes of blueberries, raspberries, cherries, earth, spice, and a hint of oak. It is full-bodied with juicy, concentrated flavors, supple tannins, and a velvety, opulent finish. Score: 92. —Robert Parker, October 2006.

and Joe Czerwinski gave it a "91":

Wine Enthusiast This is 60% Shiraz and 40% Grenache, with the Grenache providing some volume and roundness while the Shiraz provides the more assertive flavor notes. It’s a heady blend of sweet—cola—and savory—black olive and coffee—notes, with a long, supple finish. Drink now–2015. Score: 91. —Joe Czerwinski, November 01, 2007.

I love reviews. Read those three, then mine, and tell me if any of us tried the same wine. That said, I think in this case Czerwinski and Parker are a lot closer. Really, I can't imagine any reason this just got an "89" other than a price south of $20.00.

Type Red
Producer Rolf Binder/Veritas
Variety 60% Shiraz 40% Grenache
Designation Halliwell
Country Australia
Region South Australia
SubRegion Barossa
Appellation Barossa Valley
Price $19.49



The Little Wooden Guy signals "TOUCHDOWN!" This is startlingly good stuff for the dollar. Heck, it's just good stuff.

Night One

The color is very dark, turning to purple-tinged scarlet at the edges.

The nose starts with a bit of barnyard must and earthiness, probably from the grenache. It also has plenty of fruit, starting with creamy blueberries, plus the dusty, fruity smell of a bag of dried strawberries. There is also a touch of fennel.

The palate is deep and rich, with a very smooth full mouth feel. Blueberries and blackberries in cream, plus a hint of licorice, open the attack. Some tart red fruit shows up on the mid-palate. Toward the finish, add vanilla and pepper. The finish is long. This is very nice, well balanced with fruit and sweet silky tannins.

Night Two

The nose of Night Two is still fruity, but darker than on Night One, adding blackberries and elderberries to the creamy blueberries. The pepper shows up earlier on Night Two, on the attack rather than toward the finish. The fennel is still there.

The attack is very prickly peppery plus loads of black fruit, especially blackberry and elderberry. Vanilla, ample and espresso glow on the mid-palate. Tannins are very smooth and sweet. Finish is long.

This is very good. When you factor in a price under $20, it is terrific. Grenache tempers the jammy fruitiness of Barossa Valley shiraz.

A wine by any other point, tastes as sweet...

Or does it?

Last night, I attended the first of what I hope will be many Project 89 parties, with The Brix Chicks Liza & Xandria, Ward Kadel of WineLog and others. During our tasting, we tasted matched pairs of American Chardonnay, New Zealand Pinot Noir, and Australian Shiraz. One wine was given an 89 rating and one was given a 90 or above rating by one of the major critics. As we tasted these wines blind, we didn't know as we were drinking them, which was the "better" wine and which was not. I asked our team to give them our own ratings first and then reveal the "expert" opinions afterwards, to see if we agreed.

All wines were purchased from Wine.com and can be found at various sources for less (click the link to search on Vinquire!)

First up, Chardonnay from North America.

• 2006 Columbia Crest Grand Estates Columbia Valley Chardonnay

Medium golden lemon color, with a nose of butterscotch, oak and straw.
I found tons of lemon, custard, and a zingy lemon zest flavor followed by flinty mineral flavors with a bit of chalk and vanilla finish. I did see a little bit of a musty aftertaste, but over all really enjoyed this wine.

I gave it 88 points. Wine Spectator gave it 90.

Even though I'm not typically a chard person, I would buy this wine for it's ease of drinking, particularly for a party.

• 2006 MacRostie Carneros Chardonnay

The MacRostie was again, a very pale yellow color which I love in a Chard. It signals to me that it will not be an overoaked, over malolactic fermentation Sundial type wine. Thank god for that! On the nose, again there were tons of lemon and lemon zest aromas, with a hint of caramel & sandlewood.

This wine had a lot of spritz to it, and was almost bitter with it's citrus flavor. I thought it tasted a lot like flat 7-Up. And not in a good way, since there was a sharp aftertaste on the long finish.

I gave it an 86, primary because of the funky finish, although it was much better with food than without.

Wine Spectator gives it an 89.

Next, the Pinots. Both were from New Zealand, but each from a distinct area known for Piont Noir. Now I love me a NZ Pinot, so I was really excited about this pair.

• 2006 Amisfield Central Otago Pinot Noir

The Amisfield was a gorgeous garnet red color, with earth, cherry kir, ceder and a slight mint nose.

When I first tasted this wine, there was massive bright red fruit; it was definately a lighter more traditional style of Pinot Noir, and it's juicy cranberry, straweberry and cherry flavors really pop out. There was a long fruit finish, that kept my mouth watering after the wine was gone.

Wine Enthusiast gave this wine a 91, Wine Spectator gave it a 90.

I gave this wine an 89.

• 2006 Te Kairanga Martinbourough Pinot Noir

The Te Kairanga was the first wine that brought out the Venturi, a handy dandy aeration device that forces a wine to act like it has been decanted and opens it up. Before we used the Venturi however, I noticed that this wine had a cloudy deep ruby color, much different from the first Pinot we tasted.

There were strong cherry cola flavors, with dried cherries and strong earth with musty leaves.
On the first taste, I really did not like this wine at all, and gave it an 84. After running it through the Venturi twice, I still found it to be lacking and had a strange finish, although I did increase my score to 85.

Wine Enthusiast and Wine Spectator both gave it an 88.

Finally, we threw in two big boys from Australia to really pack a punch.

• 2005 Wishing Tree Western Australia Shiraz

This was a deep dark and brooding wine. On the nose, I found dark red fruits, and smoked meat.

It was lighter than I expected for the color and style, but was very pleasant with the cherry, raspberry and juicy fruit flavors.

I gave this wine an 89.

Wine Spectator also gave it an 89, while Wine Enthusiast gave it a lowly 86.

• 2005 Jim Barry "The Lodge" Clare Valley Shiraz

The deep blood red color of the Lodge smelled like dusty blackberries.
It was full bodied, but tasted slightly sour to me.

Even after running it through the Venturi, I still didn't care for this Shiraz, and only gave it an 87.

Robert Parker gave it a 90, as did Wine Spectator.

My question is, given that the Amisfield Pinot was $39.99, and the Te Kairanga was $19.79, is one point really worth a 200% price increase? I don't think so. If the Te Kairanga was given a 90 instead of an 89 would it be priced at $39? Probably. Are there other $20 wines that are undervalued? You bet.

I hope to do another 89 Project Party soon to taste more pairs!

The power of points is in marketing, not in enjoyment. So I say, points be damned and go out and drink what you like!

Happy Drinking!

Hiding Those Points

Yesterday, I attended an anniversary wine tasting at a local wine store, Wine Sense, and there were several different distributors there showcasing some of their newest wines. Most of the distributors did not have sales materials at their tables but a couple did.

At one of those tables, the distributor had a shelf talker for the 2004 Richard Hamilton Gumprs Shiraz, basically just a quote from Robert Parker and its score, 89 points. Part of Parker's quote stated: "It will provide immense pleasure over the next 2-4 years."

I chatted with the distributor about the wine, the score and The 89 Project. He was in agreement that an 89 score can be the kiss of death for a wine, and that scores really should not dictate which wines to purchase and enjoy. In fact, he decided to remove the shelf talker from his table so that no one else would see the score and so they could judge the wine on its own merits. I was pleased that he did this and maybe there will be one less distributor pushing wine just because of its scores. Maybe all of us can get involved in conversations with distributors and try to persuade them not to use scores as much in their advertising.

As for the wine itself, refer back to Parker's quote from above. Why is a wine that provides "immense pleasure" only worth 89 points? That does not seem to make much sense. Those who buy only 90+ point wines would deprive themselve of a wine that Parker claims could bring them "immense pleasure."

I found this wine to be an atypical Aussie Shiraz. First, it had more of a light red color unlike some of the usual inky dark Shirazes. Though this wine had some delicious red fruit, especially cherry and raspberry, it was not a fruit bomb. It had a lighter body and was not jammy at all. It seemed more like a Rhone wine than the usual Aussie. It had decent complexity and a moderate finish. And at $20, this wine is a good value. Did Parker score this wine below 90 points because it was not a typical Aussie Shiraz? We shall never know.

Where the Rubber Hits the Glass: d'Arenberg 2005 'The Custodian' Grenache

OK, so technically this one is an 88 (Wine Spectator). So sue me - it's close enough. And to make it even more intriguing... Stephen Tanzer of the International Wine Cellar gave it a... 90!

d'Arenberg 2005 'The Custodian' Grenache (McLaren Vale, Australia):

I'm gonna have to go ahead and disagree with the tasting notes on this one...

This wine is more full bodied, as you'd expect from Grenache it packs a buttload of booze (14.5% abv). Yes, it's got jammy fruit, along with lots and lots of berries (strawberry, cranberry...). But it feels a little 'hot', and gives the impression that this vintage is not fully representative of the big, explosive fruit that McLaren can deliver in warm years (2005 was a bit on the cool side for them).

Now, while technically I agree with WS on their sub-90 ruling, I don't agree with them on the core reasons for that ruling.

That's because I get something out of this wine that I think I shouldn't. It's floating just above the fruit after the mid-palate and it's seriously disrupting my enjoyment of the finish on this otherwise tasty sucker.

Rubber. Sniff-sniff. Damn! There is it again.

I confirmed this with some dinner guests who shared the wine (and no, we did not eat tire for dinner). They're not wine geeks, but once I pointed it out to them, there was no mistaking it.

My verdict: overall point reduction due to, well, Reduction.

Cheers!

2002 Warrenmang Grand Pyrenees, Australia

A well made wine with a blend of 34% Shiraz, 33% Cabernet Franc and 33% Cabernet Sauvignon from the Pyrenees in Southern Australia. This growing region is making a name for itself here in the states and I am seeing new producers making quality wines. This is a monster of a wine and needs a little breathing time. Aromas of raspberry chocolate ganache, fresh tobacco leaf and fresh sage.

On the palate the chocolate onslaught continues with more cherry than raspberry in the mix. Spicy and smooth, the flavors spread like a silk chocolate blanket in your mouth. The finish is long and lingering. Pair this wine with grilled meats, smoked dry rubs, or any full flavored strong cheeses.

Price: $30
ABV: 14.5%

~Marc Hinton @ Enobytes