Limpid ruby. Oak-tinged raspberry, cherry preserve and coconut scents, along with emerging tobacco and cola flourishes. Seamless and appealingly sweet, offering plush cherry, red currant and spicecake flavors that deepen slowly on the back half. A smoky quality appears on the sweet, clinging finish, which features dusty tannins and lingering chewing tobacco and mocha qualities. Raised in new and used French and American oak barrels for two years.

On first impression, this smells like a pot of freshly brewed coffee, which is fine at breakfast but not at dinner. Hard tannins are dry as bones and dust, while this tastes of black fruits, blackened spice and black coffee. Toasty oak can be a nice addition to a fine wine, but here it's overwhelming.