The 100% Wadenswil Lemelson 2011 Pinot Noir Stermer Vineyard features cassis and blackberry mingled with oak resin. Juniper berry and black pepper serve for tactile incisiveness and intrigue on a firm palate, persisting into a finish in which the sense of berry juiciness is slightly dried by the contribution of oak. As with the corresponding Powell Hill bottling, I can only very tentatively anticipate that this will be best drunk by 2017.
Eric Lemelson – about whom, and about whose vineyards, I wrote extensively in issue 202 – testified that his 2011 fruit had thinner skins, less spice, and more prominent acidity (he said “citrus”) than that of 2010. But he claims to have chaptalized “almost not at all” in 2011, while still reaching 13-13.5% alcohol in his finished Pinots, picked in the third week of October. I’m beginning to associate my tepid response to many of Lemelson’s Pinots with the tendency of both youthful gaminess and their typically 50% new wood (the balance often second-fill) to encroach on or slightly dry-out their fruit. Each of the three Pinots here reviewed in their 2011 instantiations is monoclonal; but I certainly wouldn’t suggest that they lack for complexity.
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