In the Glass: Old Friends, 20 Years Later

We rarely eat steak at my house anymore, partly for dietary reasons but mostly because beef is so expensive these days. So when we do splurge on a pack of two flatiron steaks from Costco, I use it as an excuse to dig an old wine out of the cellar, a mini “Open That Bottle Night,” as it were.1 And an excuse to use my Durand puller for old corks.2

I have neither method nor madness to the selection process; I just sort of go somewhere in the basement and start rummaging around. So for the first of those two steaks, I found a 2012 Napa Cabernet Sauvignon which unfortunately tasted of all its 15% alcohol and nothing else. Then a 2014 Merlot from McLaren Vale, which tasted like something, but not anything I’d want to put in my mouth.

So I dug deeper and found an old friend I’d purchased in a previous lifetime: Cousiño Macul Antiguas Reservas Cabernet Sauvignon 2006, from Chile. This bottle probably cost me $15, but more likely less on sale, about 17 or 18 years ago. I had visited the winery in early 2005, and have been friends with the importer, Alfredo Bartholomaus, since before that. Many years ago, I attended a vertical tasting Alfredo conducted of this wine, so I knew it could age well.

And it did — at least, it was alive and offered more than the previous two wines had. The color was brick and the fruit was faded and candied, but it displayed good acidity. The remaining fruit still danced with the tannins of the steak and brought a smile to our lips.

A few weeks later, when we didn’t really feel like cooking and the forecast carried no whisper of severe storms,3 we decided to take the second steak out of the freezer and fire up the grill. This time, I had found another old friend. A 2003 bottle of Mariah Zinfandel from Mendocino Ridge in northern California. My wife and I were fans of this wine in our early explorations, and I must have forgotten this bottle when my wine writing efforts took off. Readers may recognize the name, as Mariah Vineyards is the home of Michael Frey and Nicole Dooling and their label, DIRT Wine. I recently had the pleasure of visiting Michael and Nicole, along with Nicole’s parents, Dan and Vicky Dooling, who planted the vineyard in 1979 and have been its stewards ever since. And Michael was recently my guest here on WineLine Live.

Dan’s 2004 Zinfandel more than lived up to my memory: The color was turning to ruby-brick, but the fruit was still fresh and lively. The wine had shed any youthful tannins and baby fat, and was svelte in texture and bright with cranberry and raspberry flavors. Age lent a savory note of wild herbs, adding length to the palate. Bravo, Dan!

So the takeaway - don’t forget those gems in your cellar. As Dottie Gaiter and John Brecher would tell you, it’s better to open that bottle than wait for the right occasion that never comes. For me, I’m reassured that I had a pretty good palate in the earlier days of my wine exploration. I still have a few bottles of Cousiño Macul Cabernet, and I’m going to enjoy them soon.

Have you enjoyed similar experiences recently, rediscovering an old favorite that still delights after all these years? Let me know in the comments.

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