Tuesday, December 14, 2010

Columbia Crest 2001 Grand Estates Syrah (Washington)

Oh, this was so close to being a good wine that I must have spent a good hour trying to make it so, but alas, the cork finally got the better of it.  That's right, this wine was ever so slightly corked.  It started with a whiff of the wine in glass, something was just a little off, but when swirled it came out, but it was not too intense.  I gave it the benefit of the doubt, sniffing other glasses, thinking maybe I had a contamination issue in a glass or two (nope).  Then I sipped on the wine and you could just make out the fruit, but when I put some air through it, voila, there was that cork smell again.  Drat.  Ever so slightly corked on the nose, while the palate showed a dumbness of fruit ... but it was so slight.  Where it really showed the taint was on the finish, the aftertaste had that corkiness in spades (wet newspaper, damn moldy basement).  I did manage to drink a glass of it (cork taint can't hurt you, just the wine).  By not swirling or aerating the wine in the glass or in the mouth, and by doing so you could just make out what the wine was suppose to be, the finish took those impressions away but this would have been a great wine and one just hitting its stride, had a bad cork not taken charge ... I am hugely disappointed.

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