Tasting: a Zin and a Field Blend

• 2006 Casa Nuestra Tinto Classico – USA, California, Napa Valley, Oakville (7/29/2009)
  Rustic and earthy with dark ripe plum, tar, bacon, cedar, graphite, and black licorice. Unique field blend that for lack of a better comparison, reminds me of something I might find in an Italian village. (87 pts.)
• 2006 Outpost Zinfandel – USA, California, Napa Valley, Howell Mountain (7/28/2009)
  I’m not normally one to give a tasting note based on a wine on Day 2 after opening, but this time, that’s how it worked out. To my benefit. Yesterday the wine was unexciting: big boysenberry syrup fruit and some tart acidity but reticent on showing anything else. Today, it is showing much better. The boysenberry has been tamed to a more integrated package with some nice white pepper, freshly tanned leather, and brambly forest floor. Hold this wine until 2011 and enjoy a really good, well-balanced Zin that doesn’t overwhelm its company at the table. (90 pts.)

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