Drinking another bottle of 2000 Paracombe Cabernet Franc
I really like Cabernet Franc. It’s not a grape that gets vinified into 100% varietal bottlings very often. Certainly one of the few Australian wineries that even bothers with this grape is Paracombe.
I have talked about Paracombe extensively in this blog. I really like their range of wines and their interest in offering multiple levels of Shiraz. They also just added Pinot Gris to their list of wines too, which is an interesting choice. Clearly they’ve got a terrific climate and some perfect plots of land because they grow everything from Riesling to Cabernet Sauvignon to Sauvignon Blanc to Viognier. Nice!
The thing that’s killing me at the moment is Paracombe has on offer a degustation dinner event in October. It would cost thousands of dollars just to fly to Australia, let alone stay there for any length of time, so it sucks to be stuck in Seattle while lucky punters are treated to a six-course meal with “current and library” Paracombe wines amongst the barrels in their cellar.
Damn.
Anyway, on to the wine. I noticed that Central Market is still stocking the 2000 Cabernet Franc, so I decided to crack open and decant the bottle I’ve got at home. Here are my thoughts on this wine:
- Aroma: Strong black cherry, black plum, faint violet and tobacco, and damp earth are the predominant aromas. Perhaps a hint of blackberry too. A very luscious scent overall. I am fascinated by the musty earthiness aroma that seems to waft here and there as I drink.
- Flavor: Surprisingly dry and supple, with potent red currant and black cherry and some slight peppery spice at first. Settles into a firmly tannic yet quite drinkable wine. This one almost demands some food, though, which is a shame since I ate dinner a couple of hours ago.
- General impression: Very deep purple color and thickly scented nose betray the depth of this wine. The lack of filtration and fining is apparent in the appearance. Quite a nice wine!
The 2004 Cabernet Franc is the latest release; in the US, we run about 1 year behind the Australians in terms of getting our grubby hands on Paracombe wines. The 2004 release received a 91-point rating from critic James Halliday, which is good to see. He described that wine as follows (original citation available here):
“Strong colour, powerful leaf/tobacco leaf/black fruit aromas, the palate follows on with spices and black fruit. A serious wine.”
I couldn’t agree more with Mr. Halliday! After a few years in the bottle, the 2000 release features a little more refinement and red fruit, perhaps, than the quite young 2004. It’s a good time to drink this particular release and maybe play a little Battlefield 2, which I’m sure every wine connoisseur does on a Saturday night.
One last note: At the Paracombe Web site, they have a recipe associated with their Cabernet Franc. The recipe is for Possum Curry. That’s “possum” as in “opossum,” which is the sort of edible delicacy I associate not with fine wine, but with buckshot. I’d have some trouble obtaining 1 kilogram of possum meat in Seattle…well, actually, it would be easy to obtain fresh possum meat in the wild. The trouble would occur when it came time for me to skin it, clean it, cook it, and then eat it without passing out. Yikes.