Mount Pleasant Elizabeth 1999

I bought a case of this on release and have dipped in a few times to see how it's going. I remember tasting this soon after the initial purchase (three or so years ago) and it struck me as an especially tight Elizabeth.

This was a good bottle. An attractive green/gold colour of clarity and considerable richness. The nose shows definite signs of bottle age, but is not at a point of full maturity. Instead, the subtle, almost dumb aromas of a young semillon are mixed with a moderately intense bouquet of vanilla, beeswax and that (not unattractive) dusty note that some older semillons show. Good complexity. The entry is slippery and lively, still showing some prickly CO2. It opens to a generous and quite intense mid-palate that is in between young and old. The sophisticated, slippery mouthfeel of aged semillon is present, quite full bodied, and there are certainly hints of honey and wax, but also of (simple) primary fruit. The after palate loses thrust a bit, and the wine sort of jumps straight to the finish, where the secondary flavours linger nicely on the tongue.

This wine is very much in between in its development, with youthful characters fading a little and bottle age starting to exert its influence. As I sat with this in the glass, it gained richness and the honey really started to come to the fore. I'll track this over the next few years with interest.