This bottle of 2005 Earthquake Zin Zinfandel from Lodi came courtesy of my friend Lindsay as part of my birthday present earlier this year. With the temperatures finally settling into cold here (I miss fall, we seem to have gone straight from summer to winter....) it's time to break out the big reds. The wine had a real cork closure and clocked in at 15.9% alcohol by volume.On the nose I found blackberries, raisins, black currants, other dark fruit, and spiced cedar. In the mouth there were blackberries, black currants, a bit of spice and some other dark fruits.
Overall the wine was fruity, big, and dark. Apparently I thought it was a REALLY big wine because I wrote and underlined BIG 3 or 4 times in my notes. I served the wine with ravioli, tomato sauce and fresh parmesan. Not a great match for the dinner, the acidity of the tomato sauce didn't do any justice to the wine.
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I had this wine this year and thought it was too much (BIG is a good discriptor.) Another Lodi wine, Klinkerbrick, is close to the Earthquake Zin without going over the top. I had it with pepperoni pizza this weekend in fact!
11/5/07, 12:29 PM
Hey Orion, thanks for stopping by, haven't seen you in a bit! I'll have to look for that one, this one was certainly a big wine!
11/8/07, 12:04 AM
Sonadora,
Is the zin a balanced wine in your opinion?
Andrew
11/8/07, 1:07 AM
In general Andrew or for this particular bottle? This one was heavy on the alcohol and that didn't really go away through the whole bottle.
In general I do think that a Zin can achieve a good balance between fruit and alcohol and actually having structure. I've had some really good bottles from Mauritson and Yoakim Bridge and Ridge that come to mind as well-balanced. On the other hand, some of the appeal of Zin in my opinion is the heady fruit explosion and "big" flavors.
11/8/07, 7:41 AM