Mike's Wine Blog

My wine tasting notes, both current releases and older wines from my cellar.

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Location: California, United States

Sunday, March 27, 2005

1991 Ridge, Zinfandel, Late Harvest, Lytton Springs Estate Vineyard

Given my complaining about overripe, high alcohol Zinfandels, I decided to pop the cork on a half bottle of a real late harvest, desert style Zinfandel to compare it.

Medium dark and brick colored around the edge. Nose has strawberry and sugar. The palate has forward strawberry, raspberry flavors with hints of licorices, slightly sweet, high acid, soft tannins, and a long fruity finish. I found the fruit flavors on this wine only a touch overripe, and as a desert style wine, I found it enjoyable. The alcohol is 16.5% and the residual sugar of 1%. My rating 87.

While this wine was made from very ripe grapes (the sugar at harvest was 28%), it only tastes very slightly overripe, and this characteristic is less objectionable in a desert wine. Perhaps it is the very high acid that gives this wine a very lively feel on the palate.

In any event I like it. I probably bought it at Ridge after tasting it. This is not the kind of wine you would serve with food, other than cheese, but it is every enjoyable to drink.

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