Lady Souverain

Chateau Souverain 2000 Cabernet Sauvignon (Alexander Valley) – Club-fisted and ham-handed cabernet of acceptable quality. It hasn’t done anything I’d identify as “age,” but has instead just gotten older; drying out, turning from dark berry to dried herb and green tobacco, and dusting everything with slightly stale black pepper. That may be harsher than the wine as it exists deserves, because it’s a fair expression of grape and, to the extent that such can be discerned, a vague sort of place, but unless I’m very wrong (which would mean the wine’s just in a closed stage, though its general fulsomeness suggests otherwise), I don’t think it’s going anywhere more interesting anytime soon. Or not soon, either. (9/11)