2004 Ghost Block Cabernet Sauvignon – Oakville Estate
Ghost Block is produced by an outfit called Bonded Winery Number 9 based in Napa, California. 2003 was the first vintage of this Oakville Cabernet and by 2004 the wine was receiving modest praise. The Wine Spectator gave it a 92. Doug Wilder called it “Better than some of the cults.” and hung a 96 on his review.
Things didn’t go that well for me.
First thing I noticed on the pop was the unbranded cork. I feel like an elitist snob for saying this, but an unbranded cork? People often forget that the majority of wineries are very small family operations on tight budgets. Sometimes they’ll just use whatever they have laying around to bottle their stuff and get it out the door. Domanie Du Pegau is one such example. Pegau produces hearalded wine but often ships it with a variety of foil capsules which confounds wine collectors who think they’ve been the victim of wine counterfeiting.
But this is America, and you’re producing a top quality Napa Cab. Gimmie something on the cork so I know you’re paying attention.
At least it was natural cork.
Pop and pour I immediately got this huge green olive aroma out of the glass. I’m an olive fan. A lover of olives, if you will. But this was like sniffing olives that had been sitting around for a few days, weeks even. Not good. Some more vegetal notes were in there. Not feeling the smells, I went ahead and took a swig.
It tasted nothing like it smelled. Huge burst of menthol, tobacco and alcohol up front. Gave way to some fruit then kind of wandered off and left me without a finish to write about.
By the end of the glass the weird olivey smell had blown off and it turned into a stronger wine. Nice aromas, much better finish and a more solid wine all around
Ninety minute decant The olive smell was back, and the wine seemed to crawl back up and go away during its time in the decanter. Clunky palette and no finish.
Maybe I got an off bottle that had been spoiled somehow or maybe the wine is the the “closed down” phase so often cited by critics when a wine falls short of expectations. Regardless, the wine was disappointing and is not worth the prices it is being offered it in the secondary market.
June 26th, 2010 at 4:14 pm
Branding on the cork – it’s like the “green M&Ms” clause; if a winery didn’t focus on a detail like that, what other small details might they have missed? It certainly isn’t like those are hard to come by, especially if you’re bottling in Napa.