For a change, I have a date noted on top of my tasting note: 28/02. That gives you an idea how far behind I am.
Tannat is one of those grapes that I always mispronounce. I can never remember where the emphasis is and, as a consequence, second guess myself.
It is the red grape of Madiran in south west France, and the lesser known (to me at least) Saint-Mont. Outside France, it’s found in tiny quantities in a few places, but its second home is Uruguay, which is from where this wine, the Deicas Altántico Sur, hails.
I guess the first thing that comes to my mind when speaking of Tannat is tannins: the wines are typically big and grippy and there’s lots of colour to boot.
In the glass, this wine definitely ticked the deep colour box. The nose was pronounced and rather dominated by alcohol, but along with that was a very definitely fruit cake character which was pushing fortified. There was also chocolate, cedar and tobacco, and the black berry fruits were very ripe and jammy.
This heat followed through on to the palate, where the wine was hot and the tannins were drying. The black berry fruits were slightly fresher in the mouth and it was just a bit fruit cakey. I thought the length not bad but not particularly complex. I found the whole thing rather spoiled by an unbalanced hot finish.
Not my cup of tea, really.
Now you can read a much more positive assessment of this wine at drunk.com, which rather makes me wonder whether or not I had a dodgy bottle. I bought my bottle at auction and rather than hit the cellar it did hang around my house on a wine rack: so it’s possible that somewhere along the way it lived in less than ideal conditions. I actually bought two bottles but I don’t recall writing a tasting note on the second one. It’s also possible that Tannat is something of an acquired taste – so I guess that means I’ll have to source myself some other examples. A few wineries in Australia do dabble in this grape so it’s relatively easily available at the better bottle shops.
The wine was purchased from Wickmans, for $19 + 11% buyer’s premium (just over $21 a bottle then).
Closure: cork.
Alcohol: 14.5% abv.
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