It’s the 50th anniversary of Lake’s Folly this year. I didn’t even realise that when a friend brought this wine over. The growing season was dry in 1992 but the vintage itself was wet. Elegant and only medium-bodied with signs of uneven ripeness.
Hints of blackberry on the nose but mostly it’s about high-toned red fruits, root vegetables and tomato leaf. Those translucent primary notes are still in evidence but the oak seems to have sunk into the wine and tertiary characters are asserting themselves – old leather, sweat stained singlets, sweet earth, mushrooms and rosemary. The acidity hasn’t quite resolved to my liking but otherwise I think the balance is pretty good with savoury raspy tannin hanging in there as well. Not overly persistent. It’s not a great wine by any means but it gave more satisfaction than any attempt at an objective score might suggest. Thankfully wine is about more than numbers. 87
Region: Hunter Valley
Alcohol: 12.6%
Closure: Cork
Price: $57.50 (Current vintage)
Tasted: June 2013
I had an ’82 once. One of the most memorable wines I’ve tasted
The Lake’s Folly Cabernets can be such amazing wines. And I still really enjoyed this. It wasn’t from a great vintage and it had technical issues (length etc) but it was still a pleasure to drink.
Will you be trying the 2010 Jeremy ?
Filby – Lake’s Folly have moved onto the 2011 now I believe and from what I’ve tasted I think I prefer that vintage for Hunter reds. I don’t buy as much Lake’s Folly as I might – I like the Chardonnay too – purely because the friend who brought the above wine over is generous enough to share his LFs with me regularly. It’s not a great excuse but I can always hope he brings over a 2010 or 2011 if I don’t amend my ways
“Thankfully wine is about more than numbers. 87″
Why bother then? I also see you’ve totally ditched your (useful) descriptive score and followed all the other sheep in using a number only, which really means nothing when lined up against other scores that are different.
Sold out.
Todd – It’s a means of keeping track of my personal evaluation of the quality of the wines I taste and it does allow readers to roughly calibrate my evaluations with others – even though, as you suggest, one person’s 90 points may not exactly correlate to another’s.
I was unhappy with my worded ratings as I felt they were confusing matters. Particularly the use of the word ‘Average’. What is an average wine anyway? Under the old system this 1992 Lakes Folly Cabernet would have been labelled ‘Average’ which would have most certainly been an inaccurate description. I still provide a tasting note. It’s up to you if you think the score more important than the 100-400 words that precede it. I can’t stop you.
As for selling out what is it precisely that you think I have gained?
As a proud sheep, I do think that scores are just as descriptive as a worded rating, if not more.
Can’t imagine you ever selling out JP…
Perhaps I would if I could AG
Fortunately I’ve never encountered such an opportunity…
Todd = 78 points.
What a rude dickhead.
You’ve given Todd 78 just for showing up!
I’m happy to refund his subscription fee
What ever happened to being polite?
Jeremy,
Apologies for the sell out comment. Fair enough, it was on the rude side. As noted in an email to you previously, I am a fan of your site and style, so I hope you didn’t take it too personally. I would like to make my point(s) with a little more detail though…
Not withstanding your valid point about ample information in your tasting note (fair enough), my gripe with the numerical only score (read final judgement) still stands – how, as a consumer, can I get a feel for a wine which receives different scores from different wine journos? This is made more confusing when the “technical” description/note for a particular wine can be similar (from each journo), and even not pass comment on the actual quality of the wine.
Then there’s the issue of what quality level a particular number represents. Whether I’m on the money or not, my perception is that an 87 from, say, Gourmet Traveller for instance, is a quality drop and something to follow up, while on another publication, let’s say The Wine Front in this case, an 87 seems just an average wine (note that this is not a criticism of either GT or TWF).
I’m most likely wrong, but I get the feeling you may have felt pressured to “keep with the trend” of numerical scores. If not the case, and you’re still true to yourself, well then good o.
It’s just that your old scoring system in my eyes was much more informative, and when you told me a wine was “excellent”, I felt I had a pretty good idea what it was like. You were talking to me.
To back myself up, you mentioned in your reply that the Lakes Folly would have rated as “average” against the numerical score of 87 – well I say bugger the score and tell me you liked it!
I’m sure we’ll agree that a good tasting note will always mean infinitely more than a number or word as a post-script, but I hope you understand my frustration, and why I really liked your old system.
Thanks and regards,
Todd.
Todd – I appreciate your regard for my old system…but ultimately I make the changes I feel need to be made. There’s no outside pressure involved. Just evolution in my attempts to capture different aspects of a wine I’m tasting. Quality is but one possible aspect and yes, the score primarily deals with that. It’s not really a final judgement – it’s just another part of the picture.
I try to convey my enthusiasm or lack thereof within the tasting note. Sometimes I’m perhaps more successful than other times. It is the nature of writing to “fail” at any attempt at representation. Words can’t replace the experience of drinking the wine.
When it comes to differences between the meaning of scores I can only suggest that if you want to pay attention to them, get to know the author (as it seems you have done) and trust your gut instinct. Ultimately none of this is a science and there’s no reason to presume that scores imply some greater degree of precision than words. Wine, like life, isn’t neat. I think the better writers and reviewers out there are trying to do their best. Ultimately I don’t think any of us can ask for more than that.