[Individual images are linked below; to see them all, click here.]
As previously discussed, the capsule of this bottle was smeared with leaking, sticky, brown port. On cutting the capsule, the selo and bottle lip were stained and crusted. The cork, which was substantially raised, was wet through but sound.
The wine was dark ruby, 70%, with slight tones of orange and a pink rim.
At decanting, the nose had strong notes of strawberry jam behind the very evident VA (varnish, predominantly). The taste was strange at first: this was not very unpleasant as might have been expected, though. There was peppery heat, boiled sweets, a noticeable tannic dryness on the upper gums and a general toasted (rather than burnt) taste.
At D+8, the nose had a pronounced elderberry smell, again with varnish. In the mouth, there was wood varnish but this was not excessively offensive. Behind it, and very quickly coming through, there was a big plum taste, the same pepperiness as earlier, but a very short finish indeed.
On the second evening, the acid has largely dispersed (it's still there though). There isn't much else left either though - plums, short tannins which appear and disappear very quickly, and no finish to speak of.
This wine was not a disaster, which is what I feared, but it's clearly been both tainted with VA, and affected by the poor corking mentioned elsewhere on
.Niepoort have removed this wine from their website, so it is officially disowned.