Bordeaux Wine Enthusiasts

DavidG

Trump would be far from the stupidest President we've had (not that he has even a remote chance), but it takes a lot more than smarts to be a good President.

DavidG

Look at the bright side, Arv: if they take overly long to deliver, you can get your money back without paying the restocking fee.

DavidG

I thought hard about LLC given the outstanding impression it made on so many of you. But LLC seems to take forever to come around.

DavidG

It's too early to worry, but I guess that worrying from day one is in the pol's job description.

DavidG

Stefan, like Tom Brady, I am metrosexual, in touch with my feminine side but celebratory of my masculinity. Gee, and here I thought that just meant that your balls were underinflated. <ba-DUM-bum> :D To Nic's original question, however, I will say that I didn't think a thing about 2012 until I star...

DavidG

If no one pays attention to the points, does He exist?

DavidG

I'd vote for The Donald's hair before I would vote for the man himself.

DavidG

No doubt there's something special about the location.

DavidG

The longevity of the ranking's relevance may be a bit of a self-fulfilling prophecy. Those commanding the highest prices have the greatest resources to invest in staff and technology and are most able to afford a brutal selection process in difficult years. This then helps move them further ahead of...

DavidG

Which is why Liv-Ex is basing it on pricing now. Question is whether pricing is now or was then a good, fair or poor indicator of quality. I would say they correlate well but not perfectly, with a decreasing rate of return as you get into the uber-expensive wines. Not sure exactly where that curve s...

DavidG

I agree that pricing is not always the most accurate indicator of quality. Usually the market responds to supply and demand, with demand usually driven by quality. But there can be exceptions due to distorting factors. Scarcity is one. And a wine like Leoville Barton which has tended to lower en pri...

DavidG

I think your analysis is spot on, Hound.

Parker probably "calibrated" his Bordeaux quality meter on the vintages of the 70s. By comparison, things have been better since then. And as you say, he was the one giving out the scores.

DavidG

No, not officially. But by Liv-Ex, and based on price. I guess they've been doing this every couple of years.

DavidG

Wow, what a great day! Enjoyed the TNs on the Pichon Baron especially.

DavidG

As Francois Audouze used to say when a wine really moved him: "Such an emotion, from another planet!"

DavidG

Well done Alex! I got a bit of a vicarious thrill from reading your report.

DavidG

I don't doubt you, Danny, and I don't mean to insult the BD or the rest of our Bordeaux explorateurs, but when Hound wrote "according to the world's most widely-followed wine critic," I assumed he meant Parker. And having read Parker's review of the vintage shortly after the BWE group post...

DavidG

I'll play, but I didn't really follow Bordeaux in the '70s, so I'll guess from 1980 to 2013: The only one I'm absolutely sure about is 2013 since it was recent: average for N. Medoc, barely above average for Graves. The rest is a semi-educated guess based on memory. St Julien/Pauillac/St Estephe (Th...

DavidG

An early frontrunner for the Darwin Awards.

DavidG

It wouldn't be exciting without a glitch...

...so that's our excitement for this mission, right?

Glad it's back up and running. Losing the bugger after all these years would be a serious bummer.

DavidG

No wine last night but we had dinner on the Severn River right across from the Naval Academy and watched the Annapolis fireworks. Will need to compensate tonight. I too am surprised they allowed fireworks Arv - we were hearing on the news that just about all fireworks displays in CA were on hold. Ma...

DavidG

To go back to Patrick's point about a wine dropping from 94 to 90 points... The eRP website says this about the rating scale: 90 - 95: An outstanding wine of exceptional complexity and character. In short, these are terrific wines. So I would assume an RP 90 is a wine that he more than "merely ...

DavidG

Another nice 1998 right banker, well done! And I love those Zalto glasses. We've got both the Universal and the Bordeaux. There's a lot of love for the Burgundy version but they are just too big for me.

DavidG

Five points up or down is really a big jump. And what about the people who bought the wines years ago based on his ranking? Alex R. Live by the sword, die by the sword. Win some, lose some. Anyone who thinks this is an exact science is not being realistic. Parker has been pretty consistent on most ...

DavidG

Blanquito wrote:The big take aways I think are that this vintage is confirmed as excellent across all levels and it will be longer lived than he initially thought

+1

DavidG

Agree, the Chateaux have taken a lot of profit out of the futures game. There are always a few wines that spike in price after a 100-point Parker upgrade, but that's a crapshoot. With Parker's semi-retirement, it will be interesting to see if that influence fades. We should be able to tell in short ...

DavidG

I agree your wine will probably be fine if it's red Bordeaux and shipped in styro. The trip from DC to Lewiston should be quick. It's unlikely to get hot enough in the bottle to cook it. And even if it does get warm enough to shorten the drinking window or impede long-term aging, that shouldn't be a...

DavidG

I don't know the magic temperature number or length of time but suspect there is a spectrum. Lesser damage likely takes longer to show up and is less obvious. And Cab-based reds are probably more robust than Burgs, whites and Champagnes.

DavidG

Presumably he's very consistent and repeatable. I suppose that might be true. I can't fathom making a to-do over a 2-3 point difference, even for the same observer tasting the same wine on 2 different occasions. He would probably say that his point is that anyone with two wines in front of them tast...

DavidG

Nice, Danny! Thanks for the report. How long have you been holding on to that '64 Duhart?

DavidG

I agree with Stefan. If the corks are pushed or you see leakage, it's not a good sign. But a bottle can be damaged without those obvious signs. I've also heard that a fine film of sediment on the side of a bottle can be a sign of heat damage. Sediment that is almost fused to the glass and doesn't ri...

DavidG

Wow indeed. I thought the 2005 Lascombes was absolutely stunning. "Generally panned" is probably too strong a phrase. I've seen some highly negative comments from prominent AFWE palates (too ripe, too sweet, too oaky, too modern, no sense of place), but it has a 92.5 avg and 93 median CT ...

DavidG

Nice summary Rob. I bought a moderate amount of '94s. The 1991, 1992 and 1993 Bdx were all more or less panned and I was tired of buying California Cabs while waiting for the next decent vintage in Bdx. Alex, I await your reprimand on being such a vintage-whore. I'll take my lumps gracefully. It is ...

DavidG

A quick tour through the notes and it looks like start dates have been pushed out as well as end dates. And scores seem to have trended down just a bit for those "fine Northern Medocs" (with a few exceptions), and to have trended up a bit on the right bank (again with exceptions). One wine...

DavidG

I remember the debate here on BWE when the wines were first offered and then released. Some like SteveH thought them too acidic and tannic to come around, but they also had the fruit and concentration for others to be gung-ho. Or was it extract, with its negative connotations, rather than concentrat...

DavidG

Hubert de Bouard will be joining us? Yes I have been Angelus' staunchest defender here on BWE. But I have to admit that as time has passed and the wines (and I) have aged, I have found that even on the right bank there are other wines that have surpassed it. I don't know if it's my palate changing o...

DavidG

If you let the Nazis have their flag, pretty soon they'll start asking for the Sudetenland. The slippery slope argument cuts both ways. Take away their flags now, and who knows what we'll be taking away next? Allowing expression of beliefs we disagree with or find despicable (as long as they don't ...

DavidG

Hound, I agree in principle that state-sanctioned marriage and all of the legal accoutrements could be replaced by contractual agreements between the parties and changes to the various laws about spousal benefits and rights, taxes, criminal prosecution, etc. Seems like a lot of effort to make a poin...

DavidG

Thanks for the notes and commentary Ian. I drank my last 1994 Angelus a few years ago. I liked it a bit more than you but I agree on the harshness on the back palate and finish. Although Angelus is a perennial favorite, I too don't thin it measures up to Cheval Blanc. It would be fun to do a side by...

DavidG

I sold all my 2000 first growths when prices got silly, so I can't comment on them, but I've had a number of very good experiences with 2000 left bankers, including Leoville Poyferre, Smith Haut Lafitte, Giscours, Pichon Baron and Leoville Barton. They are still improving, but not a disappointment i...

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