August 22, 2014 – Wine: 2004 Merryvale Profile

I have always said that if an expensive wine fails to impress you when young, lock it away in your cellar and forget about it for a while.  Such is the case with this wine.  I was absolutely spellbound by the 2001 Profile in its youth.  I sought out nine half-bottles in an auction and began working my way through them.  But, like most 2001’s, the Profiles gradually lost what made them special and settled in to become merely nice wine.  By contrast, the young 2004 Profile could not hold a candle to the 2001’s, and having bought six half bottles, I set them in a remote spot in the cellar wine collection and forgot about them.  When I opened bottles in 2010 and 2011, the wine was medium bodied and nicely balanced, but it lacked any kind of wow! factor.  Now, three years later, I open the next bottle and was pleasantly surprised.  The wine has put on weight and developed incredible complexity, both on the nose and the palette.  I noted primarily flavors of pencil lead, black plums, dark currants, minerals, and baking spices.  Now I have to wait a little while longer to open the one remaining bottle, knowing that this wine has begun overachieving.

2004 Merryvale Profile