Amiral de Beychevelle

Vintage: 1989
Producer: Amiral de Beychevelle
Appelation: St. Julien, Bordeaux

On My Palate:

Sour cherry but overwhelmingly poopy (brett !) on the nose. A led, mineral core on the palate with high red fruit tones struggling to express themselves.

The Dregs:

Mike, one of my tasting partners, says that brettanomyces (“a rogue yeast that negatively affect the taste and smell of wine”) in small doses can add a degree of complexity to a wine. American wine drinkers’ are calibrated to fruit-fruit driven wines. When the odd, non-fruit component of an old world wine spikes their tongue, they typically pucker the mouth fiercely and reach for another bottle of Rossi or Gallo or, on special occasions, Mondavi; all three American wine pioneers. Yet, the curious wine drinker, like Mike, looks, even yearns, for non-fruit character, which this wine is full of.

Here, however, on my palate, the brett renders this wine one-dimensional, and is just as bad as a one-dimensional, American fruit bomb. While new world wineries are criticized for being too sterile, many French wineries could use a centennial spring cleaning.

Again, old world traditionalists can learn from new world modernists.

Amiral is the second label of Chateau Beychevelle, a fourth-growth wine from the Haut-Médoc; and 1989 has been proclaimed a stunning vintage.

The true test of any big boy wine is his younger brother….

Where:

In the empty lounge at Addison del Mar. The Sabonet silver clinks against the Bernardaud porcelin and echoes under the vaulted ceiling.