Drinking the 2004 Robert Biale Grande Vineyard Zinfandel
I’m back in Southern California again, on what I might call my second honeymoon in about 6 months. The first honeymoon was wonderful, but it sort of ended abruptly the moment (literally) we got home again for other reasons. So although the last 6 months have been fun, they have also been extremely tiring for my wife and I.
Therefore, we decided to head back down to California and go to one of our favorite places, which shall remain nameless. All I can say is this place has a natural hot spring, gorgeous grounds with loads of citrus trees bearing gigantic ripe lemons and grapefruits, and a spa where we’ll be going later today for a 90-minute massage. This place is tranquil and wonderfully relaxing. Clearly this is the kind of place where you want to drink an entire bottle of wine with dinner.
And that’s just what I did last night! We ate at the restaurant on site, a terrific place in terms of the quality of the food and the atmosphere. The service is charming, which is to say the service is neither exceptional nor terrible, but somewhere in between (closer to exceptional). I brought in a bottle of 2004 Robert Biale Grande Vineyard Zinfandel, which I had decanted but the waitress had never used a decanter before. She was quite nervous and she poured a small amount of wine on the table, which I found hilarious. She was quite embarrassed and she ended up waiving the corkage fee, a terrific compromise between using the restaurant’s decanter and watching some of the wine land on the tablecloth.
Anyway, the Robert Biale Vineyards & Winery is a fascinating place, with a tremendous focus on its heritage as a grape farm rather than a winery. The Biale family moved to Napa during the Great Depression, a challenging time to decide to sell Zinfandel wine grapes I would imagine. But they persevered and in 1991 they began making their own wine from their grapes. At the present, they make a whole host of other red wine varieties, but their Zinfandels continue to garner the most acclaim, at least from what I can tell by searching for Biale wines on the Internet. In my correspondence with the people at Biale, I have been quite impressed with their responsiveness and positive attitude. So for quite some time, I have wanted to try a Biale Zinfandel.
I found this Biale Zin at Jensen’s Foods, a relatively local supermarket with a wonderful wine selection. I also managed to pick up a bottle of 2004 Green Truck Pinot Noir while I was there, so I know what I’ll be drinking tonight! Anyway, I picked up this Biale release (which is already a year old; the 2005 is the current release) for $47. You can find this wine for less on the Internet; $34 seems to be the best price, but realistically the cost is over $40/bottle.
The Grande Vineyard, from which these grapes are sourced, was planted by a man named Theodosio Grande. I can’t think of a better name for an Italian grape farmer. The 2004 Biale Grande Zin is a big, bold wine for sure. It clocks in at 16.4% alcohol and there were only about 350 cases made from the 84-year-old vines (they were planted in 1920, so now they’re 87 years old). The amazing thing is, this wine is so well-balanced that you don’t taste the alcohol whatsoever. But you do taste plenty of other stuff; here are my notes:
- Aroma: Lots of blackberry syrup/jam, cassis, and clove spice, with some secondary notes of cinnamon bark and oak. A very “Gothic” bouquet, so to speak, as all of the sumptuous aromas seem to come from black fruit or dark wood. Extremely potent and room-filling right from the start.
- Flavor: Delicious blend of the promised blackberry, but with some interesting hints of black cherry and baking spice lurking underneath. After some time in the decanter, the black cherry comes to the front in harmony with the juicy blackberry and spice flavors. Very mild acid and tannic content, just enough to keep the fruit in check.
- General impression: A potent, delicious wine that tastes terrific with gazpacho (spicy!!), filet mignon (blackberry), tapenade (cherry), and even with salmon!
Overall, I was quite happy with this wine. My wife liked it a lot with her tapenade and salmon dishes, which made me happy because my wife has lately convinced herself that she only likes Pinot Noir. I have steadily been trying to convince her otherwise, and thanks to this Biale Grande Zinfandel I am on my way.