Well, I ended up opening the Cougar Crest Anniversary Cuvee 2003 for Christmas. Somehow I couldn’t bring myself to drink a bottle of plonk for the holidays. I can’t say that I had fully recovered from my cold so my senses were somewhat affected. Still, it was quite an enjoyable wine. I have had a good deal of 2002 and 2003 Cougar Crest wine of late. The 2002 Cougar Crest Cabernet when we paired it with other Washington 2002 Cabernet seemed like it was quite past its prime. Additionally, when I had the 2003 Cougar Crest Syrah in the past few months, it has seemed as if it is on the downward path and wasn’t overly enjoyable after being exceptional about a year and a half. This was a wine that I had truly loved, so I was a bit surprised to see it drop off so quickly. I was interested to see how the 2003 Anniversary Cuvee was holding up. Overall the color of the wine definitely showed some age with some browning along the edges. Quite interesting for a wine that is only five years old. Still, it had the classic Cougar Crest nose of spice and birthday cake along with a mouth coating taste filled will cherry. The wine is clearly past its peak, but I would say still has one to three years to be very drinkable and enjoyable.

Leave a comment and let me know what you ended up opening.