2007 Arietta H Block Hudson Vineyard
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Tasting notes
(14.1% alcohol): Dark ruby-red. Deep, sexy nose combines black raspberry, currant, musky molten chocolate, coffee and toffee. Broad, sweet and plush, with its dark raspberry, licorice and black pepper flavors lifted by a spicy quality. Seriously tannic but not dry, this blend spreads out horizontally to saturate the palate. While it has the restrained sweetness to give pleasure already, this very rich wine has enough acidity and ripe tannins to maintain its shape in a cool cellar for at least another decade. With 24 hours in the recorked bottle, it shut down and showed more obvious tannic spine.
Critic scores
Average Score
Robert Parker
Stephen Tanzer, Vinous
More reviews and scores
The 2007 Red Wine H Block is soft, pretty and delicate. Now almost fully tertiary, the 2007 is a wine to drink over the next few years. Sweet tobacco, licorice, torrefaction, cedar and incense add complexity throughout, but the 2007 is losing both fruit and freshness. Like so many of these vintages of H Block, the new oak influence is considerable.
(55% cabernet franc, 45% merlot): Bright medium ruby. Expressive, very ripe aromas of black raspberry and smoke. Rich, broad and fat with fruit; compellingly thick and deep in the style of the vintage but with its ultimate character still hidden behind baby fat. Quite dense and fine-grained wine with enough juiciness and sweet tannins to give it the guts to age. This very nicely balanced blend is most impressive today on the long, building, thick finish.
(a 55/45 blend of cabernet franc and merlot) Good deep ruby-red. Pungent minerality lifts the aromas of black cherry, licorice and violet. Creamy, smooth and dense, but with superb floral definition to the lush black fruit flavors. Most impressive today on the rising finish, where the serious but fully ripe tannins coat the front teeth. A great H Block vintage in the making, this has the tannic structure of a serious Right Bank wine.