1973 Joseph Swan Zinfandel Sonoma County

Both the 1973 Zinfandel and the 1972 Zinfandell-Lot 1 are still in excellent condition. While they are fully mature, they exhibit no signs of fading. Both have fragrant, spicy, oaky, earthy, sweet jammy noses that are completely intact and showing no signs of fading fruit. The 1973 appears fresher and more alive, but both are full-bodied, intense wines with copious quantities of glycerin, heady alcohol, and considerable extraction of flavor. This was the first time I tasted these two vintages, so I have no sense of how they tasted when young, but my feelings are that they are capable of lasting another 4-6 years if kept in a cool cellar. If anyone can claim to be the pioneer of high quality Zinfandel, it is the late Joe Swan. His blockbuster, super-intense, artisanal style of Zinfandel inspired such current luminaries as Joel Peterson of Ravenswood and Jerry Seps of Storybook Mountain Vineyard. There is no question that the Zinfandels that have emerged under the Joseph Swan label in the eighties are not nearly as intense as those he produced during the seventies.