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2006 Acclaim
December 27, 2006
Wine Adviser Year's best Washington wine? Here's my top 100
By Paul Gregutt Special to the Seattle Times
With two exceptions, I have elected to list just one wine per winery, although many producers named here have delivered a full lineup of outstanding wines. The wine listed is the one that I felt was the best. This ranking is not done strictly by the numbers, although these are all wines that score very well on the 100-point scale...
Paul Gregutt's Best of Washington State Wine 2006
# 4. Betz Family Winery 2003 Père de Famille Cabernet Sauvignon
December 06, 2006
The Wine Enthusiast had reviewed our 2003 Cabernet Sauvignon Père de Famille earlier this year, awarding it a 95 point rating (“Superb, a great achievement”). In their end of the year wrap up they placed it at Number 92 on their Top 100 Wines of the Year:
“Firm, chewy, young, and tight and yet quite supple and fulfilling, this stunning Cabernet is packed with a rainbow of fruit flavors- blueberry, black currant and black cherry- that open into a seamless, beautifully proportioned wine. The scents and flavors run the gamut from citrus peel to clove to soy to chocolate, espresso and beyond. The best yet from this extraordinary producer.”
December 01, 2006
Our recently released 2004 Syrah La Cote Rousse was the top rated red wine of the Wine Spectator's December 15 issue's Highly Recommended Spectator Selections:
95 points Classic, a great wine HIGHLY RECOMMENDED
BETZ Syrah Red Mountain La Côte Rousse 2004, $45
Deep, dark, dense and powerful, a reverberant mouthful of smoky blackberry, black cherry and licorice, hinting at pepper and cream as the finish sails on and on. Gorgeous stuff, and the tannins are beautifully managed. Best from 2008 through 2014.— H.S.
And the 2004 Syrah La Serenne and Bésoleil were highly rated in the same issue:
93 points Outstanding, a wine of superior quality and character
BETZ Syrah Columbia Valley La Serenne 2004, $45
Polished, elegant and refined, but packing a punch of intensity to the spicy, peppery, blackberry and dark plum flavors, lingering on the sharply focused finish. This has pizzazz and depth. Best from 2008 through 2014.—H.S.
89 points, Very Good, a wine with special qualities
BETZ Bésoleil Columbia Valley 2004, $40
A bit chunky for this style, with cherry and spice flavors that finish lithe and juicy, lingering beautifully on the finish. Grenache, Mourvedre and Syrah. Best after 2007.—H.S
November 30, 2006
Steve Tanzer tasted these wines in July, 2006 during his annual Washington visit, written up in his November/December 2006 issue. La Serenne claimed the highest score given to any Washington Syrah.
2004 Betz Family Winery Syrah La Serenne Columbia Valley 93 points
($45; 100% syrah, entirely from Boushey Vineyard fruit; aged in 40% new oak) Full medium ruby.
Knockout nose features black raspberry, blackberry, bitter chocolate, truffle, minerals, leather, gunflint, meat and violet; this couldn't be anything but syrah. Wonderfully sweet, seamless and deep, with an enticing spicecake character to the complex berry, mineral and mocha flavors. Perfectly judged oak (40% new) contributes precision without being at all intrusive. Finishes classically dry and exotically spicy, with thoroughly ripe tannins and terrific grip. (A second bottle showed an even more perfumed blackberry quality.) Betz noted that this wine in past vintages was more French in style, but that in 2004 it's the Cote Rousse that's more Old World.
2004 Betz Family Vineyards Syrah La Cote Rousse Red Mountain 92(+?)
($45) Saturated ruby. Wild aromas of blackberry, licorice, gunflint, musky espresso, exotic spices and mesquite. Sweet on entry, then tight in the middle, with firm acids giving a strong structural underpinning to the complex flavors of blackberry, minerals, game, cured meats and earth. Very densely packed but not as showy or opulent today as the Serenne, owing to its reductive quality. Betz advises enjoying the Serenne over the next five years, then starting on this one.
2004 Betz Family Winery Bésoleil Red Wine Columbia Valley 92
(a blend of 68% grenache, 18% mourvedre and 14% syrah) Bright medium ruby. Exotic, almost candied aromas of cherry, raspberry and pepper; very Southern Rhone in its liqueur-like character. Fat, sweet and stuffed with expressive black raspberry liqueur flavor. Wonderfully lush and pliant wine yet also quite succulent, finishing expressive, sweet and very long, with a hint of leather.
2004 Betz Family Winery Poggiòlo Rosso Columbia Valley 90
(a 60/40 blend of sangiovese and cabernet sauvignon) Deep medium red. Musky aromas and flavors of plummy dark fruits, espresso, meat and mocha. Juicy and spicy in the mouth, with sound acids giving the wine lovely delineation and grip. The cabernet adds density to the sangiovese without overwhelming it. Very sexy wine, finishing with sweet tannins. Made without any new oak. I'd enjoy this over the next three or four years.
By the way, we gave Steve Tanzer a sneak preview of our 2004 Bordeaux-style wines that will be released in March of 2007. While they had been bottled only 4 months earlier, he was able to evaluate them despite their youth. In fact the Cabernet Sauvignon came in as the third highest rated Cabernet in the state, a point or two behind Leonetti Reserve and Quilceda Creek.
2004 Betz Family Winery Clos de Betz Red Table Wine Columbia Valley 92(+?)
($34; a five-variety Bordeaux blend based on 59% merlot) Bright, deep red. Musky, sweet aromas of dark cherry, roasted red berries, graphite, leather, roast coffee, herbs and tree bark. Sweet, concentrated, very ripe and floral but showing less early opulence and more structure than recent vintages of this bottling. (Bob Betz notes that it was too easy to make fruit bombs in 2004 owing to the ripeness of the fruit and naturally high pHs. The merlot in particular had high sugar levels without accompanying phenolic maturity in early September and he was tempted to harvest the two sides of the vines separately. In the end, he used petit verdot and malbec to give the 2004s structure and length.) With aeration, though, this showed compelling sweetness and noteworthy depth. This builds impressively toward the back, finishing with strong, juicy fruit; firm, fine-grained tannins; and excellent lift.
2004 Betz Family Winery Cabernet Sauvignon Père de Famille Columbia Valley 93(+?)
($46; blended with 9% malbec, 8% merlot, 3% petit verdot and 2% cab franc) Bright, deep ruby-red. Musky, minerally, spicy aromas of blackberry, blueberry, leather and tree bark. Quite penetrating on the palate, with terrific intensity and cut to the black cherry and currant flavors. Denser and larger-scaled than the Clos de Betz. This, too, finishes with excellent cut, growing sweeter and longer as it opens in the glass. There's firm tannic spine here but no impression of dryness.
October 27, 2006
“...While many winemakers initially found success by blending grapes from multiple sites, they increasingly are turning to single-vineyard efforts. Look no further than Betz's two Syrahs, produced from vineyards 25 miles apart. La Serenne emerges silky and refined, a product of the cooler Yakima Valley, while La Côte Rousse, sourced from the minuscule Red Mountain AVA, is dense and unyielding, filled with tough tannins.
2004 Betz La Serenne Columbia Valley Syrah ($45)
The more approachable of Betz's two Syrahs has almost overwhelming aromatics of roast cherry, game meat, prosciutto, white mineral and a lifting scent of red berry. In perfect balance, with pronounced acidity that's amplified on the finish.
By contrast, Betz's 2004 La Cote Rousse Syrah ($45) is thicker, more tannic and still slightly closed - a sign of its Red Mountain roots."
April 01, 2006
Winemaker of the Year
A certified Master of Wine (one of 250 in the world), Bob Betz is arguably the most studied winemaker in the state, if not the nation. But the results found at his winery illustrate the value of applied knowledge: His wines — including two stellar Syrahs that have collected uniform rave reviews and a masterful Cabernet Sauvignon — carry a depth and elegance rarely found in the United States. Moreover, Betz's tireless advocacy and support for local wines have helped convince industry tastemakers of the state's extraordinary potential. He's a well-reasoned voice speaking for Washington, with a rare expertise that compels others to listen.
April 01, 2006
Highlights of booming Woodinville
Newly housed in an immaculate and carefully designed facility just up the road from DeLille Cellars, Betz Family continues its unbroken string of beautifully rendered — let's just say it — sensational wines. New this year is a very limited grenache. The best deal remains, as before, the Clos de Betz. The 2003 has just been released ($32). It's intensely fragrant, seamless, toasty and lush, as it wraps layers of caramel, butterscotch and creamy oak around yummy plum and black-cherry fruit.
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