I don’t think it’s necessarily a beginner wine. The vast majority of “beginner wines” are either balanced, but dull or intense, but unbalanced. They either are so innocuous they fade into the background or have so much of everything that their flaws are more readily masked.
My impression is that AH is not masking flaws with intensity and definitely is not bland. Yet there is also a distinctive “house style.”
I’d phrase it this way. Cabernet is the canvas (or one of the canvases) upon which AH expresses their house style. Cabernet is a means to an end–it can support ripeness and provide structure to build a wine of high intensity and richness quite successfully.
Many very experienced drinkers and collectors prefer this paradigm. I have never tasted a Sin Qua Non (SQN) wine, for example, but the descriptions of SQN are clearly of wines where the grape variety provides a scaffolding over which some very exotic and rich producer style is overlaid. For many, it is a unique producer ‘personality’ that is sought.
The other direction that wine drinkers tend to go over time is looking to experience difference through varied regions and grape varieties. There is a lower level of ripeness and imposition of “house style” where intrinsic character of the grape is on more even footing if not dominant in the wine.
Either way, the tendency is for wine drinkers to expand interests over time, but it’s not always in one dimension.
About three years ago I served the 2015 AH Cab blind at a tasting to a group of 30 casual wine drinkers, most of whom would say they know they like red or white better, maybe some know they like Malbec or Chardonnay. You get the gist. None were experienced tasters. I served it alongside 2015 Chateau d’Armailhac. Both $50 wines, very different in style. I’d say the Austin Hope was the clear favorite of maybe 25% of the group, some of whom absolutely loved it. Another 25% liked both equally. Everyone recognized the clear stylistic differences between the two.
I don’t personally enjoy drinking Austin Hope wines very much, but I understand and respect the tastes of those who do.
Agreed…However, I would say that experience with drinking a variety of wines and education about wine tends to change people’s subjective idea of what is good. While “rich, thick, intense and powerful” certainly doesn’t mean that a wine is less good (even to me), I do believe that with experience, these characteristics cease to be a “stand-in” for “good wine”. There are plenty of wines I love that have these descriptors, but they are not the REASON I love the wines. And, as you say, there’s noting wrong with folks who believe a wine is good just because it has high alcohol and density. But in my experience, people who taste a lot of wine over time, stop viewing such characteristics as inherently making the wine “delicious”.
After reading your comment I had “Chateau d’Armailhac” on the brain so I swung by Total Wine today and grabbed a 2017. It’s delish! Really enjoying it. Obviously a completely different animal than Austin Hope (any of them) - I’m getting a lot more layers, or “dimension” from this. There’s just a lot more to pick apart. I don’t know that I like it more than AH, but I can see being in a mood for this one night, and in the mood for the other another night. Same thing with my bourbon and scotch library; some nights I want a pour of Pappy, some nights I want a Glendronach. Completely different taste profiles, but neither is bad by any stretch in my opinion.
I think people are confusing ‘beginner’ with an ‘approachable’ wine.
Austin Hope is a crowd pleaser. It is complex enough that their own style comes out and it offers something that I instantly pick up as unique to Paso cab.
Is it some multi-layered work of art that evolves greatly in the glass? No. But you don’t need to be an expert in nuance to see why it’s good and that in of itself shows it is a well made wine when drinkers across the spectrum can enjoy it.
I’m opening one of my 2012 D’Armailhac’s
It was one of the first Bordeaux’s I bought and I still have it.
Never tried.
I bought 3 more in NJ recently as the reviews were so enticing I couldn’t pass up the price they were going for.
I also have never tried a AH Cab either.
But want to very much.
When I first started drinking wine I would have loved this wine. As others said sweeter and more oak than what I like now. That being said when I first started drinking wine I drank Dr. Pepper daily so drinking Bordeaux would not have worked. As I stopped drinking soda my tastes did change and I tried the world of wine.
I still like Australian Shiraz but different styles than I first gravitated too. There is good wine around the world from all regions and if you like Austin Hope keep enjoying it but try other regions and see if you like those too.
Totally agree that they’re different wines for different purposes. Glad to hear you like the both of them - bodes well for finding more gems in the future
