Appearance
Pale ruby with blueish tinge at the edge of the glass.
Nose
Perilla! This is, at first, seemingly modest in aromatic strength. It has aromas of fresh herb of delicate nature, shiso(a variety of Perilla), mitsuba(Japanese honewort), lemon balm which is beautifully integrated with later emerging fresh red fruits of reassuring balance of sweetness and gentle acidity such as brightly reddened cherry. It has rather modest aromatic intensity at the beginning of the blind tasting. Afterward it gradually became just a bit bolder with its fruitiness getting slightly more dominant.
Palate
At first I felt striking similarity of the flavour with that of a homemade fresh juice prepared with shiso...
(Shiso is a variety of Perilla which is relatively common in Japan as a garnish of a traditional dish. If got interested, please try shiso maki(shiso roll) in a traditional sushi restaurant.)
For me, this is not a wine of clearly distinctive varietal characteristics. It might be felt vague as it has nothing like a punchy attack of Cabernet Sauvignon or a peppery hike in aftertaste of Syrah. However it has just a controlled level of herbaceousness which is later accompanied by also beautifully tamed fruitiness. Although it has a bit higher tannins than expected from its pale colour, the nature of tannin is also tamed downed into the extent that it just lifts the freshness of the wine. Alcohol is kept well in check with other components(freshness, flavour, acidity), to some extent, masks its presence. The nature of acidity is reassuringly gentle.
With my old memory of shiso juice reasonably set aside, I personally liked this wine. In the current environment producers around the world are striving for ideal balance of alcohol and flavour. The styles preferred in the market, I believe, is shifting from heavily-extracted reds universally reminiscent of Bordeaux Crus Classés toward slimmer reds from a variety of regions(especially cool) around the world all with striking balance between flavour, acidity and alcohol...etc. Even though, a wine with such a high sophistication is, for me, hard to find.
