I found this lone bottle of 2005 Lytton Springs living at the bottom of a pile of recent vintages of various zinfandels from Ridge at my local bottle shop. I was very skeptical about its provenance, and also unsure about the aging potential of zinfandel-based blends based on my admittedly limited experience with the varietal. But, the price was (very) low, so I figured I'd give it a shot.
Upon opening and having an initial taste my impression was "Oh, this is probably dead". Wasn't giving up anything on the nose–super muted, and the palate was flabby and tasted a little cooked. Decided to leave it in the decanter for the evening while I finished some other wine. When I came back to it about 4 hours later it was a different animal.
Appearance: Garnet fading to ruby red, with a watery rim. Almost opaque. No sediment (but some flecks of cork from buggering it with the Ah-So).
Nose: Very complex, and something different on each examination. A surprising amount of red fruit (sliced red apple, tart cherry) reminiscent of aged right bank Bordeaux. Leather and mushroom, a subtle rubber hose thing. Also a subtle bready/yeasty note.
Palate: Medium bodied, and pretty agile for the size of the wine. Again, a surprising amount of brambly fruit. Brambleberry, mulberry, some fig and date stuff going on, but not in an "overextracted, cooked old wine" sort of way–more so just the primary flavors from the zin and petite sirah still hanging on. Mushroom, leather, iodine, clay, blood/iron, and a walnut thing on the finish. Surprisingly grippy, with soft tannins and gentle acidity holding everything together–seems like the carignane was doing some heavy lifting in the blend.
Not the greatest, but since all I usually drink with this much age are Bordeaux, Nebbiolo-based wines, Rioja, and dessert wines, this was a departure. I like it.
by arassus_doom_330