Decant Stop Tasting Wine Blog

We were very lucky to get this wine, and the luck runs deep with this purchase.  As you already know, if you’ve read this blog at all, we’re relatively new to “the serious” wine scene.  As such, we don’t have a cellar with 10+ year old wines to pull from, from time to time.  That day will come eventually, but for now, we’re stuck trying to find those wines for a price we can afford… because we tend to like them quite a bit.  Of course with age comes risk – risk of spoilage.  We don’t know how this wine was stored all these years.  Lucky for us, apparently it was stored well.

I got this wine during K&L’s Italian wine clearance sale.  The original price was $17 and was on sale for 4 BUCKS!  I figured, for 4 bucks my expectations would be low and it wouldn’t matter much if it was spoiled or just not that great.  But we totally hit paydirt with this one.

The bottle showed obvious signs of age, with the typical exterior bottle mold/tarnish.  When I cut the foil off there was a little mold/fungus/whatever growing on the top of the cork.  I don’t know why, but I really like this.  Its kind of like unearthing a treasure chest.  I’m sure it looks like hell on the outside, but what’s on the inside is what counts, and I was indeed looking for a gem here.  I decanted it and found that plenty of the tannins had adhered itself to the interior of the bottle – again, something I enjoy seeing.  I did, however, and don’t blast me for this, shake the bottle up after pouring a little into the decanter.  I figured some of the tannin would come off and I wanted to taste it.  So when I poured the first bit into the glass it was a little cloudy.  I expected this, and still wanted to check it out anyway.

Here’s an interesting thing that we’ve never experienced before… you know when you chew spiramint gum, there’s the nice cool sensation in the back of your mouth and throat?  This wine has that… a little less so than the gum, but there never the less.  We found this delightful and fresh feeling.

Already the nose was awesome!  A bit of orange and lemon peel, herbs, and [the only way I can think to describe it] terroir in total, along with the entire plant, not excluding the fruit, which was pretty forward (in an old world way).  I couldn’t wait to see how it smelled and tasted an hour, two hours later!  The tast was basically just like the aroma, with little to no vegital aspect.

It has a medium-light body and very low acid.  Rika asked me to serve a wine that would go with sushi, because that’s what she was serving.  So I looked for someting just like this… fairly light, complex, and low acid.  I can’t believe how on the money I was, despite knowing very little about this wine.

After about an hour of decanting, the wine takes on more of the spiramint that was barely noticable when we first openned.  Once the wine clarified I could describe the color as very “barolo-esque”, which typically has an orange tint to it.  It is a beautiful wine, certainly a great one for a romantic situation.  The aroma is so pleasing and far from “the norm”.  The flavor, and in fact the overall experience, if compared to the average wine, could be described as the difference between a pleasing sandwich (the average wine) and a true gormet dish the energizes the mind, analyzing the flavors you are savoring.  I wish I could have tasted this wine when it was released, just to know what the age really did for it.  For all I know it might have been better, or even very sub-par.  What I do know is that I wish I had a case of this so I can drink it every time I have sushi… at least for a while.  I’m in no hurry to finish this wine, but it is so yummy I keep sipping it!  We’ll have to make it last until the 2 hour mark at least though.

Price:  $17

Rating:  92

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K & L Wines:  1998 was one of a string of good vintages in Piedmont that lasted from 1996 to 2001. This 1998 dolcetto is mature, to be sure, but if you let it breath for a bit it has really compelling aromatics and flavors. If you’re looking for Depression Era pricing for older vintage wine, this wine works!