by Tom Hill

A self-admitted wine geek, Tom lives in Northern New Mexico and works as a computational physicist at Los Alamos National Laboratory doing numerical neutron transport & large scale code development. He has been tasting wines since 1971, participates locally with a couple of large tasting groups in his area, and is practically a fixture at most California wine festivals, such as the Hospice du Rhône, Rhône Rangers, and ZAP. Other interests: Tom is heavily into competitive sport fencing (foil & epee), biking, cooking, basketball, skiing, backpacking, mountain climbing.

Jill Cashman hosted a Dessert & Dessert Wine tasting at SantaCafe the other Sunday. Patrick Markby, one of the best dessert chefs in SantaFe, IMHO, did an extraordinary job on the desserts to accompany the wines. John Bernasconi of Botique Wines organized the wine selection and made commentaries. Jill was there to lend color and flair. The wines:

1. Lawson's Dry Hills Marlborough Late Hrvst Semillon (13.5%) 2000: Med.gold color; lush botrytis/peachy/apricotty/spicy more R-like nose; tart/lean somewhat sweet spicy/flowery/ R-like almost grapefruity light botrytis/peachy flavor; long spicy/flowery/R-like light botrytis finish; more like a German botrytis Mosel than Semillon; lovely wine.
2. Bodega Olivares Monastrell Dulce Jumilla/Spain 1998: Med.color; very ripe/grapey/late harvesty Zin-like some raisened/pruney nose; sweet chocolaty/plummy LHZin-like slight oxidized bit hot/fumey flavor; med.long hot/fumey quite LateHarvestyZin/raisened/grapey finish w/ light tannins; from very old/ungrafted Mourvedre vines; nice w/ the chocolate; very much like a LateHrvst Zin, was expecting a more spectacular wine.
3. Fattoria Le Fonti Vin Santo del Chianti Classico (16%) 1997: Med.brown color; some sherry- like/oxidized bit pungent nose; tart slightly sweet slight oxidized/sherry some pungent/ grapey flavor; bit hard/hot/alcoholic but not as oxidized as some.
4. Selbach-Oster Zeltinger Sonnenuhr Riesling Auslese 2001: Fragrant pineapply/flowery/R bit simple nose; very tart/lean/hard some pineapply/flowery/R slight earthy/slatey  flavor; long sttely/slatey/tart/hard some simple/R/pineapply finish; bit simple now but  should be a good one w/ 10 yrs of age.
5. Wittman Westhofener Steingrube Albalonga Beerenauslese 1998: Med.yellow color; very  fragrant/perfumed/grapey earthy light botrytis/pear/peach nose; tart some sweet clean/ripe/ pear light botrytis/peach some earthy flavor; med.long bright/spicy/grapey light earthy light botrytis/pear/peach finish; not as big & sweet as I expected; needs age.

1. Abalonga: A Rieslaner (Riesling x Sylvaner) and Sylvaner cross. Never had one before. This was quite a nice/elegant/delicate dessert wine w/o the rich/ripeness I was expecting.