Tasting an early bottle of Forlorn Hope’s 2012 St Laurent
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Last September 2012, I was lucky enough to witness the harvest of 90 St Laurent vines from a vineyard in Carneros. Several years ago, Matthew Rorick of Forlorn Hope Wines had convinced the vineyard owner to keep the few clusters intact to be made as one of Rorick’s unusual creatures. He has since managed to expand the collection to include a few more vines in the same location. I’m excited to see how the 2013 harvest goes as a result.
In the meantime, Rorick’s 2012 St Laurent is still in the aging process before release. However, he recently pulled a bottle and shared a preview with a few of us. I was able to take the bottle home and enjoy it over the two days following.
Forlorn Hope’s 2012 St Laurent (aka. Ost-Intrigen) begins all plush sheered-velvet across the palate, a textural pleasure bringing pert red fruit and flower-spice integrated with dried herbs and orange zest. The acidity pulses vibrancy ushering in a long finish. As the wine uncurls with air, the flavors deepen. The fruit stays primarily red with back beats of blackberry seed spice, accents of saffron and smoke, and a move from orange zest to mandarin. By the end, the wine takes on all the appeal of fresh picked cherries pitted and served in fresh baked pie. The crust is crisp. The fruit is tart but deepened from the baking. To make the pie, the cherry has been squeezed over with lemon juice first–the lemon itself does not show in the final flavor, but brightens the cherry in the final pie. The finish is long on this wine with a stimulating zing, full of igneous rock minerality.
To put it simply, 2012 turned out lovely plush fruit for Rorick’s rare creature. I’m excited to drink this wine again. I love pie. It’s my favorite.
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Thank you to Matthew Rorick for sharing the early bottle of his St Laurent.
Forlorn Hope Wines: http://forlornhopewines.com
To see photos of the 2012 St Laurent harvest: http://wakawakawinereviews.com/2012/09/17/harvesting-california-st-laurent-matthew-rorick-and-forlorn-hope-wine/
Copyright 2012 all rights reserved. When sharing or forwarding, please attribute to WakawakaWineReviews.com.
