(Re-Tasted July 2013) ... People are going to start to believe I have stock in Hillebrand with the amount of wines I have reviewed lately in this column ... but as it turns our it is just their turn to get picked on as their wines have come up in the run. I noticed that one of the wines had an original review published at the time of its release, the other has a note some 5 years later in the Lost and Found column, both are linked above. Let's start with the 2007 wine, which is the one that failed to garner an original review and languished until I tried it last year around this time. Turns out that last year it was merely tolerable, a year later it is almost undrinkable (unless you have nothing else about the house and are dying for a drink). The 2007 is fat, flat and uninspiring ... the nose is much better than the palate as it delivers grapefruit, lemon and lanolin notes; also noted was that the citrus fruit is zest based and not fresh. The acidity on the palate is practically non-existent and the wine comes off as thick and sweet but with a bitter and unpleasant finish. In 2012 I said "the wine gained more of an apple juice character", now I would say it's apple juice that has gone sour. The 2006 is a completely different story, one year older this wine still comes off as fresh and lively: pear, peach and apple rule the nose, with pear being the most prominent ... the palate retains a healthy dose of acidity and it appears on the tip of the tongue as well as lingers on the finish. Mid-palate comes off a tad sweet with all that great white fruit character, but the finish forgoes any notion of sweetness for a mix of green apple and peach with hints of limeade ... okay so maybe sweet and mouth pucker fight it out, but very pleasantly ... the big winner here is the 2006 ... by a landslide.
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