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.

 
1. Rhodes Vineyard Colorado Chardonnay Sweet Table Wine; P&B by S.Rhodes Vineyard, Hotchkiss, CO;  1997: Dark gold color; strong very ripe/overripe/rotted apples some creme brulee/ butterscotch pudding slight oxidized nose; very sweet bit oxidized very ripe/ overripe/rotted apples lush flavor; long/sweet rotted apples slight oxidized finish; tastes like Chard left out on the vine to dehydrate after leaf drop; kinda interesting in an eccentric sort of way; would be great w/ butterscotch puddin.
2. Chateau Nairac Barsac/Sauternes; Proprietaires: M & Mme Heeter-Tari; 1980: Med.dark gold color; rather toasty/oaked/toasty coconutty butterscotchy some botrytis/peachy caramel some old Sauternes nose; soft slightly sweet rather toasty/pencilly/Fr.oak slight earthy/oxidized caramel/butterscotch/creme brulee bit peachy/botrytis flavor; med.long soft slight oxidized/old Sauternes light peachy/botrytis rather toasty/caramel/toasted coconut finish; interesting atypical old Sauternes.
3. Rosa d'Amore Sweet Malvasia di Casorzo (5%) NV: Med. cherry/red color; fragrant/ grapey/cherry/muscatty some Lambrusco-like soda-pop perfumed nose; spritzy very bright/cherry/Nehi soda pop/cherry cola off-dry grapey/muscatty flavor; med.short cherry/soda pop/muscatty slight earthy flavor; loads of grapey character and a bit like a Lambrusco-Lite.

1. Nairac: In the late '70's, Mr. (Tom?) Heeter married the Tari daughter (of Leoville- Las Cas fame?) and they were given (dowery?) the old/run-dowm Ch.Nairac Sauternes property to run, as I understand it. With lots of infusion of $$'s, they started to turn out some interesting Sauternes. Eventually the couple parted ways and the property sort of went down-hill to my tastes. Haven't had anything of recent vintage from Ch.Nairac, so don't know what's going on there now. I gather Nicole and son Nicolas now run the property. Presume Tom returned to America.