Tablas Creek Vineyard Blog: Tablas Creek Through Three Eras: Tasting Every Esprit de Beaucastel and Esprit de Tablas, 2000-2023

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Tablas Creek Through Three Eras: Tasting Every Esprit de Beaucastel and Esprit de Tablas, 2000-2023

July 01, 2024

There are two ways that we try to work systematically through the collection of wines in our library. At the beginning of each year, we taste every wine we made ten years earlier. These horizontal retrospectives give us an in-depth look at a particular year, and a check-in with how our full range of wines is doing with a decade in bottle. I wrote up the results from our 2014 retrospective tasting back in January. And then each summer we conduct a comprehensive vertical tasting of a single wine, where we open every vintage we've ever made and use that to assess how the wine ages and if we want to adjust our approach in any way. This also serves as a pre-tasting for the public tasting (which this year will be July 14th) at which we share the highlights.

It was a surprise to me that it had been a full five years since we did a comprehensive tasting of our flagship red wine. We do open older vintages of our Esprit de Tablas (formerly Esprit de Beaucastel) with some regularity, but still, those piecemeal investigations are different than what you get if you look at all the vintages in one sitting. Our last time doing so was in 2019, and we've also done retrospective tastings that I've written up on this blog in 2017, in 2014, in 2010, in 2009, and in 2006.

So, it was with anticipation that our cellar and vineyard team joined me to taste 23 vintages of Esprit last week. We started with our first-ever 2000, and finished with the newly-blended 2023. Note that there was not a 2001, as a spring frost particularly impacted the Mourvedre and we made the decision not to bottle an Esprit red that year.

My notes on the wines are below, as well as each year's blend. I've linked each wine to its page on our website if you want detailed technical information, professional reviews, or our tasting notes from when the wines were first released. I've tried to be more descriptive of personality than flavor in these notes, as otherwise it would just be a litany of different ways to say dark red fruit, chocolate, and loamy earth.

2000 Esprit de Beaucastel (35% Mourvedre, 26% Syrah, 25% Grenache, 14% Counoise): A fully mature nose that leans fully into the earthy, black olive savoriness, though there's also black cherry fruit and a little minty lift. The palate is even more savory, with lots of loamy earth and iron. Chewy texture. Still some significant tannins and an iodine note on the end. The fruit may be fading a bit and this on the end of its run. But what a run it has been.
2002 Esprit de Beaucastel (57% Mourvedre, 27% Syrah, 10% Grenache, 6% Counoise): A bit on the dense side, lacking some of the lift in the 2000. But packed with dark chocolate and leather, with a brambly black fruit note and a meaty spice cabinet, potting soil earthiness. A little on the monolithic side, but impressively concentrated still.
2003 Esprit de Beaucastel (50% Mourvedre, 27% Syrah, 16% Grenache, 7% Counoise): Like the best parts of the two previous wines, with more refinement than the 2000 and more vibrancy than the 2002. A pretty sweet tobacco and milk chocolate character on both nose and palate, with a plummy note and great acids. My favorite of the oldest vintages.
2004 Esprit de Beaucastel (50% Mourvedre, 27% Syrah, 17% Grenache, 6% Counoise): Powerful and structured, savory, with oak forest and bittersweet chocolate notes and substantial tannins. A nice licorice note provides some lift. Not terribly giving now, though there's plenty there and it's in nice balance.
2005 Esprit de Beaucastel (44% Mourvedre, 26% Grenache, 25% Syrah, 5% Counoise): Leaps out of the glass with a meaty, smoky nose, that also has these vibrant red fruit elements. Very inviting. The palate is open in a way the previous wines weren't, with noteworthy freshness and a minty eucalyptus note over the fruit and leather notes. Felt both mature and fresh, which was a lovely combination.
2006 Esprit de Beaucastel (45% Mourvedre, 28% Grenache, 22% Syrah, 5% Counoise): The nose has a confected note that was a reflection of its era, when we were pushing for more ripeness, but also a bay-like herbiness providing contrast. The palate is concentrated and the most extracted of any of the wines we tasted, with a figgy density and a little grittiness to the tannins. Not my favorite style of Esprit, though it's undeniably impressive.
2007 Esprit de Beaucastel (44% Mourvedre, 29% Grenache, 21% Syrah, 6% Counoise): A roller-coaster of a wine, with powerful fruit, meatiness, and minty lift. The palate is luscious and densely tannic, with a licorice sweetness and an iodine-like minerality giving contrast to the currant fruit. This seemed young still to us, and just starting to hit what should be a long peak.
2008 Esprit de Beaucastel (38% Mourvedre, 30% Grenache, 26% Syrah, 6% Counoise): Very different from the vibrancy of the previous few vintages, quieter with milk chocolate and sugarplum. On the palate, pretty, mature flavors of anise, chaparral, and fig. I thought it was starting to tire out a bit on the palate, with just a hint of oxidation. This wine, which was a favorite of many of us when it was 10-15 years old, may be starting on the downslope.
2009 Esprit de Beaucastel (40% Mourvedre, 28% Syrah, 27% Grenache, 5% Counoise): A more structural nose, with menthol and bay, iron and grape candy. Quite young-tasting, with plenty of tannin and a licorice note flowing into pipe tobacco and currant fruit. There's still a hint of the hardness that this wine inherited from the exceptionally low yields in this frost vintage, but the concentration of fruit carries it. Given how much this has improved just in the last six-to-eight years, I tend to think it's still getting better.
2010 Esprit de Beaucastel (45% Mourvedre, 30% Grenache, 21% Syrah, 4% Counoise): A quite different nose, more black fruited with a pine forest note that speaks of the cool year. The mouth has a lovely dark chocolate and blackberry preserve coolness, with a floral violet note that we all loved. Fresh and youthful, but elegant too. A consensus favorite among its cohort, and in a lovely place.
2011 Esprit de Tablas (40% Mourvedre, 30% Grenache, 20% Syrah, 10% Counoise): Some similarities to the 2010 in tone, though there's a Campari-like herby lift that didn't appear in the 2010. On the palate, like the 2010 with a little more tannic grip, leather and brambles and star anise overlaying the black fruit.
2012 Esprit de Tablas (40% Mourvedre, 30% Syrah, 21% Grenache, 9% Counoise): A much more red-fruited nose is reflective of the warm year and generous yields of 2012. Mid-weight and pretty with a red raspberry note and a little florality. Not our most concentrated and impressive Esprit, it's undeniably pretty and drinking very well now. I'd tend to drink mine sooner than later.
2013 Esprit de Tablas (40% Mourvedre, 28% Syrah, 22% Grenache, 10% Counoise): Though still more red fruited than black, this shows more complexity than the 2012, with pancetta-like meatiness and a pithy blood orange freshness on the nose. The tannins are a bit more present as well, providing backbone to the flavors of sweet spice, charcuterie, and cherry cola.
2014 Esprit de Tablas (40% Mourvedre, 35% Grenache, 20% Syrah, 5% Counoise): A clean, pretty nose like grape candy and fresh green herbs. The mouth is red-fruited like 2012 but more concentrated, with raspberry and bramble, dried leaves and green tea. There's a Rhone-like garrigue note we all liked a lot. This is the highest percentage of Grenache that we ever used in Esprit, and it feels it, in a nice way, but could maybe have benefited from a little more of the darker grapes.
2015 Esprit de Tablas (49% Mourvedre, 25% Grenache, 21% Syrah, 5% Counoise): Like a more ethereal version of 2014, with tart pie cherries on both the nose and palate, given definition with green herbs and teriyaki spice. On the palate, pomegranate and red licorice and Campari notes, all high tones. This will undoubtedly gain more depth over time. Not a particularly great showing for a vintage that's been one of my favorites in recent tastings, and possibly entering a closed period.
2016 Esprit de Tablas (46% Mourvedre, 31% Syrah, 18% Grenache, 5% Counoise): More black fruited than any vintage since 2011 and meatier than any vintage since 2007, with bramble, licorice, teriyaki marinade and wild strawberry notes, great texture, and this persistent bay-like herby lift. Complex and complete, powerful without any hint of overripeness. A consensus favorite among the wines that are about a decade old.
2017 Esprit de Tablas (40% Mourvedre, 35% Grenache, 20% Syrah, 5% Counoise): An appealing nose, like the 2016 evenly balanced between red and black fruit, with spicy teriyaki and cool eucalyptus elements. The palate shows currant and plum fruit, expressive and textured, with plenty of tannin but no hardness. A treat.
2018 Esprit de Tablas (40% Mourvedre, 27% Syrah, 23% Grenache, 10% Counoise): A quieter nose, pretty with cola and meat dripping notes and a little violet florality. The mouth is beautiful, with plum and sweet spices. Pretty and long but balanced. Like a slightly less dramatic 2017.
2019 Esprit de Tablas (39% Mourvedre, 30% Grenache, 21% Syrah, 10% Counoise): Red fruited with an lifted notes like menthol and wild strawberry, meat and wet stone. The palate showed cherry skin grip with red licorice and chalky tannins. Focused and intense with serious tannins, this has a long life ahead.
2020 Esprit de Tablas (40% Mourvedre, 30% Grenache, 21% Syrah, 5% Counoise, 3% Vaccarese, 1% Cinsaut): A nose of raspberry and chalk, sweet butter and rosemary. The mouth is generous with redcurrant and graphite, candied orange peel and a creaminess that reminded me of vanilla custard. A wine we're happy to remember from a year most of us would prefer to forget.
2021 Esprit de Tablas (35% Mourvedre, 26% Grenache, 23% Syrah, 7% Vaccarese, 5% Cinsaut, 4% Counoise): Juicy on the nose, but deepened with an herby bitters note. On the palate, dark, savory, structured, and full of promise, with mouth-filling texture and a lingering crushed rock minerality. A baby.
2022 Esprit de Tablas (40% Mourvedre, 28% Grenache, 22% Syrah, 4% Vaccarese, 3% Counoise, 3% Cinsaut): Very purple on the nose, with boysenberry and candied violet notes, lupine florality, and a confectioner's sugar sweet dustiness. The mouth shows cooler notes of cedar, grape candy, and aromatic bitters. Substantial tannins, good acids, and lingering minerality are all the pieces of something great. Will be bottled in August.
2023 Esprit de Tablas (33% Mourvedre, 31% Syrah, 26% Grenache, 6% Cinsaut, 2% Counoise, 2% Vaccarese): A dark nose with Syrah in the forefront right now: black fruit and guanciale, mocha and spicy Mexican chocolate. On the palate that darkness mellows to mint chocolate, blackberry cobbler, and a little minty lift. Plush texture and tannins cloaked in fruit and chalky mineral notes. Very, very exciting.

A few concluding thoughts:

The overall quality of the wines was exceptionally high. I asked everyone around the table to pick seven favorites, and 15 of the 23 vintages got at least one vote. Top vote-getters included 2000 (7 votes), 2003 (4), 2005 (4), 2010 (7), 2016 (6), 2017 (5), 2019 (4), and 2023 (4). I was pleased that there were favorites among our oldest and youngest wines, and everything in between.
It felt to us like there were three distinct eras in our Esprit history. The first of these eras, between 2000 and 2007, leaned toward opulence, but also had this wild edge to them. Lots of fruit, tannin, meat, and spice, with fruit tone that leaned a little more black than red. The second era stretched from 2008 to 2015, and showed redder fruit tones and greater refinement. These were less bombastic wines, less tannic, but also less concentrated. As they get to their teenage years, it also seems that they might be a little less long-lived, though we're still looking at 15-20 years of outstanding drinking at least. Finally, there's a third era that started in 2016 and continues through today. To my mind, these wines have the best of both worlds. There's more black fruit than we were getting in that 2008-2015 era, though it's still usually secondary to the red fruit. There are fresher acids than we were getting in either of our first two eras. There's concentration to the fruit, persistence to the texture, and vibrancy to the herby non-fruit elements that are welcome and complementary. And this comes without the higher levels of extraction and alcohol that we saw in our early years. Is it a coincidence that 2016 was the first year that we were farming the whole vineyard Biodynamically? Or a function of the increasing number of head-trained, dry-farmed lots that we now have to choose from in blending? It's fascinating to think about.
The blend is not a particularly good guide to the wine's character. If you think about it, that's probably not surprising. One of the main levers we have to keep a consistent balance of fruit and structure is the ratio of Grenache to Syrah. In more structured, tannic vintages (think 2007, 2011, or 2019) we tend to add less Syrah and lean heavier into Grenache to make sure we have the appropriate level of vibrancy. And in more open, juicier vintages (think 2003, or 2012, or 2018) we tend to rely on higher percentages of Syrah to add structure and depth. So don't assume that the years with more Syrah are going to show more black fruit and tannin than the years with more Grenache.
Don't forget the vintage chart. We update this chart several times a year based on the results of tastings like these, wines we open in the normal course of life, and feedback we get from customers and fans. It's there whenever you want it.
Sound fun? Join us on July 14th! We will be hosting a version of this event that is open to the public, and Chelsea and I will be leading the discussion and sharing insights into how the wines came to be the way they are. The vintages we have tentatively chosen to share are 2000, 2003, 2005, 2007, 2010, 2016, 2017, 2019, and 2023. You can read more about the event, and get your tickets, here.

Posted at 05:51 PM in Events, Library Wines | Permalink | Comments (2)

Comments

2000 Esprit de Beaucastel (35% Mourvedre, 26% Syrah, 25% Grenache, 14% Counoise): A fully mature nose that leans fully into the earthy, black olive savoriness, though there's also black cherry fruit and a little minty lift. The palate is even more savory, with lots of loamy earth and iron. Chewy texture. Still some significant tannins and an iodine note on the end. The fruit may be fading a bit and this on the end of its run. But what a run it has been.
2002 Esprit de Beaucastel (57% Mourvedre, 27% Syrah, 10% Grenache, 6% Counoise): A bit on the dense side, lacking some of the lift in the 2000. But packed with dark chocolate and leather, with a brambly black fruit note and a meaty spice cabinet, potting soil earthiness. A little on the monolithic side, but impressively concentrated still.
2003 Esprit de Beaucastel (50% Mourvedre, 27% Syrah, 16% Grenache, 7% Counoise): Like the best parts of the two previous wines, with more refinement than the 2000 and more vibrancy than the 2002. A pretty sweet tobacco and milk chocolate character on both nose and palate, with a plummy note and great acids. My favorite of the oldest vintages.
2004 Esprit de Beaucastel (50% Mourvedre, 27% Syrah, 17% Grenache, 6% Counoise): Powerful and structured, savory, with oak forest and bittersweet chocolate notes and substantial tannins. A nice licorice note provides some lift. Not terribly giving now, though there's plenty there and it's in nice balance.
2005 Esprit de Beaucastel (44% Mourvedre, 26% Grenache, 25% Syrah, 5% Counoise): Leaps out of the glass with a meaty, smoky nose, that also has these vibrant red fruit elements. Very inviting. The palate is open in a way the previous wines weren't, with noteworthy freshness and a minty eucalyptus note over the fruit and leather notes. Felt both mature and fresh, which was a lovely combination.
2006 Esprit de Beaucastel (45% Mourvedre, 28% Grenache, 22% Syrah, 5% Counoise): The nose has a confected note that was a reflection of its era, when we were pushing for more ripeness, but also a bay-like herbiness providing contrast. The palate is concentrated and the most extracted of any of the wines we tasted, with a figgy density and a little grittiness to the tannins. Not my favorite style of Esprit, though it's undeniably impressive.
2007 Esprit de Beaucastel (44% Mourvedre, 29% Grenache, 21% Syrah, 6% Counoise): A roller-coaster of a wine, with powerful fruit, meatiness, and minty lift. The palate is luscious and densely tannic, with a licorice sweetness and an iodine-like minerality giving contrast to the currant fruit. This seemed young still to us, and just starting to hit what should be a long peak.
2008 Esprit de Beaucastel (38% Mourvedre, 30% Grenache, 26% Syrah, 6% Counoise): Very different from the vibrancy of the previous few vintages, quieter with milk chocolate and sugarplum. On the palate, pretty, mature flavors of anise, chaparral, and fig. I thought it was starting to tire out a bit on the palate, with just a hint of oxidation. This wine, which was a favorite of many of us when it was 10-15 years old, may be starting on the downslope.
2009 Esprit de Beaucastel (40% Mourvedre, 28% Syrah, 27% Grenache, 5% Counoise): A more structural nose, with menthol and bay, iron and grape candy. Quite young-tasting, with plenty of tannin and a licorice note flowing into pipe tobacco and currant fruit. There's still a hint of the hardness that this wine inherited from the exceptionally low yields in this frost vintage, but the concentration of fruit carries it. Given how much this has improved just in the last six-to-eight years, I tend to think it's still getting better.
2010 Esprit de Beaucastel (45% Mourvedre, 30% Grenache, 21% Syrah, 4% Counoise): A quite different nose, more black fruited with a pine forest note that speaks of the cool year. The mouth has a lovely dark chocolate and blackberry preserve coolness, with a floral violet note that we all loved. Fresh and youthful, but elegant too. A consensus favorite among its cohort, and in a lovely place.
2011 Esprit de Tablas (40% Mourvedre, 30% Grenache, 20% Syrah, 10% Counoise): Some similarities to the 2010 in tone, though there's a Campari-like herby lift that didn't appear in the 2010. On the palate, like the 2010 with a little more tannic grip, leather and brambles and star anise overlaying the black fruit.
2012 Esprit de Tablas (40% Mourvedre, 30% Syrah, 21% Grenache, 9% Counoise): A much more red-fruited nose is reflective of the warm year and generous yields of 2012. Mid-weight and pretty with a red raspberry note and a little florality. Not our most concentrated and impressive Esprit, it's undeniably pretty and drinking very well now. I'd tend to drink mine sooner than later.
2013 Esprit de Tablas (40% Mourvedre, 28% Syrah, 22% Grenache, 10% Counoise): Though still more red fruited than black, this shows more complexity than the 2012, with pancetta-like meatiness and a pithy blood orange freshness on the nose. The tannins are a bit more present as well, providing backbone to the flavors of sweet spice, charcuterie, and cherry cola.
2014 Esprit de Tablas (40% Mourvedre, 35% Grenache, 20% Syrah, 5% Counoise): A clean, pretty nose like grape candy and fresh green herbs. The mouth is red-fruited like 2012 but more concentrated, with raspberry and bramble, dried leaves and green tea. There's a Rhone-like garrigue note we all liked a lot. This is the highest percentage of Grenache that we ever used in Esprit, and it feels it, in a nice way, but could maybe have benefited from a little more of the darker grapes.
2015 Esprit de Tablas (49% Mourvedre, 25% Grenache, 21% Syrah, 5% Counoise): Like a more ethereal version of 2014, with tart pie cherries on both the nose and palate, given definition with green herbs and teriyaki spice. On the palate, pomegranate and red licorice and Campari notes, all high tones. This will undoubtedly gain more depth over time. Not a particularly great showing for a vintage that's been one of my favorites in recent tastings, and possibly entering a closed period.
2016 Esprit de Tablas (46% Mourvedre, 31% Syrah, 18% Grenache, 5% Counoise): More black fruited than any vintage since 2011 and meatier than any vintage since 2007, with bramble, licorice, teriyaki marinade and wild strawberry notes, great texture, and this persistent bay-like herby lift. Complex and complete, powerful without any hint of overripeness. A consensus favorite among the wines that are about a decade old.
2017 Esprit de Tablas (40% Mourvedre, 35% Grenache, 20% Syrah, 5% Counoise): An appealing nose, like the 2016 evenly balanced between red and black fruit, with spicy teriyaki and cool eucalyptus elements. The palate shows currant and plum fruit, expressive and textured, with plenty of tannin but no hardness. A treat.
2018 Esprit de Tablas (40% Mourvedre, 27% Syrah, 23% Grenache, 10% Counoise): A quieter nose, pretty with cola and meat dripping notes and a little violet florality. The mouth is beautiful, with plum and sweet spices. Pretty and long but balanced. Like a slightly less dramatic 2017.
2019 Esprit de Tablas (39% Mourvedre, 30% Grenache, 21% Syrah, 10% Counoise): Red fruited with an lifted notes like menthol and wild strawberry, meat and wet stone. The palate showed cherry skin grip with red licorice and chalky tannins. Focused and intense with serious tannins, this has a long life ahead.
2020 Esprit de Tablas (40% Mourvedre, 30% Grenache, 21% Syrah, 5% Counoise, 3% Vaccarese, 1% Cinsaut): A nose of raspberry and chalk, sweet butter and rosemary. The mouth is generous with redcurrant and graphite, candied orange peel and a creaminess that reminded me of vanilla custard. A wine we're happy to remember from a year most of us would prefer to forget.
2021 Esprit de Tablas (35% Mourvedre, 26% Grenache, 23% Syrah, 7% Vaccarese, 5% Cinsaut, 4% Counoise): Juicy on the nose, but deepened with an herby bitters note. On the palate, dark, savory, structured, and full of promise, with mouth-filling texture and a lingering crushed rock minerality. A baby.
2022 Esprit de Tablas (40% Mourvedre, 28% Grenache, 22% Syrah, 4% Vaccarese, 3% Counoise, 3% Cinsaut): Very purple on the nose, with boysenberry and candied violet notes, lupine florality, and a confectioner's sugar sweet dustiness. The mouth shows cooler notes of cedar, grape candy, and aromatic bitters. Substantial tannins, good acids, and lingering minerality are all the pieces of something great. Will be bottled in August.
2023 Esprit de Tablas (33% Mourvedre, 31% Syrah, 26% Grenache, 6% Cinsaut, 2% Counoise, 2% Vaccarese): A dark nose with Syrah in the forefront right now: black fruit and guanciale, mocha and spicy Mexican chocolate. On the palate that darkness mellows to mint chocolate, blackberry cobbler, and a little minty lift. Plush texture and tannins cloaked in fruit and chalky mineral notes. Very, very exciting.

A few concluding thoughts:

The overall quality of the wines was exceptionally high. I asked everyone around the table to pick seven favorites, and 15 of the 23 vintages got at least one vote. Top vote-getters included 2000 (7 votes), 2003 (4), 2005 (4), 2010 (7), 2016 (6), 2017 (5), 2019 (4), and 2023 (4). I was pleased that there were favorites among our oldest and youngest wines, and everything in between.
It felt to us like there were three distinct eras in our Esprit history. The first of these eras, between 2000 and 2007, leaned toward opulence, but also had this wild edge to them. Lots of fruit, tannin, meat, and spice, with fruit tone that leaned a little more black than red. The second era stretched from 2008 to 2015, and showed redder fruit tones and greater refinement. These were less bombastic wines, less tannic, but also less concentrated. As they get to their teenage years, it also seems that they might be a little less long-lived, though we're still looking at 15-20 years of outstanding drinking at least. Finally, there's a third era that started in 2016 and continues through today. To my mind, these wines have the best of both worlds. There's more black fruit than we were getting in that 2008-2015 era, though it's still usually secondary to the red fruit. There are fresher acids than we were getting in either of our first two eras. There's concentration to the fruit, persistence to the texture, and vibrancy to the herby non-fruit elements that are welcome and complementary. And this comes without the higher levels of extraction and alcohol that we saw in our early years. Is it a coincidence that 2016 was the first year that we were farming the whole vineyard Biodynamically? Or a function of the increasing number of head-trained, dry-farmed lots that we now have to choose from in blending? It's fascinating to think about.
The blend is not a particularly good guide to the wine's character. If you think about it, that's probably not surprising. One of the main levers we have to keep a consistent balance of fruit and structure is the ratio of Grenache to Syrah. In more structured, tannic vintages (think 2007, 2011, or 2019) we tend to add less Syrah and lean heavier into Grenache to make sure we have the appropriate level of vibrancy. And in more open, juicier vintages (think 2003, or 2012, or 2018) we tend to rely on higher percentages of Syrah to add structure and depth. So don't assume that the years with more Syrah are going to show more black fruit and tannin than the years with more Grenache.
Don't forget the vintage chart. We update this chart several times a year based on the results of tastings like these, wines we open in the normal course of life, and feedback we get from customers and fans. It's there whenever you want it.
Sound fun? Join us on July 14th! We will be hosting a version of this event that is open to the public, and Chelsea and I will be leading the discussion and sharing insights into how the wines came to be the way they are. The vintages we have tentatively chosen to share are 2000, 2003, 2005, 2007, 2010, 2016, 2017, 2019, and 2023. You can read more about the event, and get your tickets, here.