Hello; Friday, we met over four bottles of Cab from four different countries, in the (vain) hope of finding the difference. A fool´s errand, of course. These were dsitinctly entry level products, where you do not expect to find much expression of terroir - it´s red, they´ll drink it; hey, it´s a good quaff; goes well with grilled hamburgers ... The background, once more, is the impending exam in our 2-honors course. You get 2 points fo the variety, one point for correct country, and another if you cn pinpoint the district, or region. You have the option of putting up a second alternative - if that is correct, you get half a point for that. So how did this turn out?
1 [n] sweet, vanilla, oak, mucho alcohol, dark berries, marshmallows [p] sweetness in theattack, amazingly low acidity, for a Cab, slight notes of menthol and eucalyptus Not much cassis. In fact, is this CabSauv? ¨
2 [n] Dry, mineral (chalk/lime?) smokey, slightly animal (cowshed), Jell-O pudding, cassis, peppermint and eucalyptus [p] THis, too, had the sweetness in the attack but not as overwhelmingly as #1. Acidity more pregnant, even though the sweetness tended to disguise it somewhat. This, particularly after some time in the glass, evolved more cassis, and a certain fudgy character. After 1-2 hours, it fell apart in a hodgepodge of rough tannins and acidity.
3 [n] Very discrete nose,took its time to evolve. MArzipan, distinctly animal, toast, cassis, and dill [p] More restrained sweetness, balanced acidity. Ceder, smokeyness
4 [n] Jammy, sweet, cassis, fruit, honey, smoke ... [p] Some mineral, appeared slightly "unclean", very tannic
There was considerable agreement that #3 was "best", or, the one we preferred, #2 next, and 1/4 solidly jumbo.
And here they are ... prices in Danish crowns (DKK)
1: Gallo Turning Leaf California CS 2003 DKK 80
2: Wolf Blass CS South Australia 2003 DKK 90
3: Longridge CS Coastal region (SOuth Africa) 2003 DKK 99
3: Explorer CS Concha y Toro Maipo Valley 2003 (Chile) DKK 69
According to previous exams, the wines we will be supposed to identify will be in this price range. Oh, and in case you wonder - I scored 1½ points, putting me jumbo - Xina and our friend Jan-Olof scoring 2 points each, while Catarina, the wife of J-O topped us at 2½ points.
I owe my one point to Anders T´s remark concerning Chilean CS: "Chile is cassis, cassis and more cassis... You get tired from that after a while.."
Cheers
Nils Gustaf