2004 BOND Matriarch
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Tasting notes
The 2004 Matriarch, which I had rated 93 in 2008, was fashioned from the lots culled out from the single-vineyard wines. This is the most open-knit and evolved of all these 2004s. Full-bodied with fabulously concentrated chocolaty, espresso, black currant and blackberry fruit notes, it is fragrant, silky smooth, broad, supple and altogether captivating. This is a beauty to drink over the next 10-15 years. A brilliant project of Harlan Estates’ proprietor, Bill Harlan, these single-vineyard wines have been everything a Cabernet connoisseur could ever hope for since they were first released. Amazingly, these wines taste better with age than they did young, which is exactly what Harlan and his winemaking team of Bob Levy and consulting enologist Michel Rolland are trying to prove.
Critic scores
Robert Parker
Stephen Tanzer, Vinous
More reviews and scores
Good red-ruby. Plum, mocha and chocolate on the nose. Lush and seamless on the palate, with a sappy, liqueur-like raspberry flavor complicated by leather and smoke. There's something Bordeaux-like about this broad but lively wine. Perhaps ultimately less suave than the young 2005 but today this is even longer.
Deep red. Enticing aromas of redcurrant, black raspberry and tobacco. Sappy red fruit flavors show lovely concentration and sweetness, with firm acids and a minty element contributing to the wine's inner-mouth aromatic character. Finishes with substantial dusty tannins and a lingering flavor of red cherry.