Bordeaux Wine Enthusiasts

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The exact aim of getting full phenolic ripeness is getting seeds inside the grape and skins ripe and the same time. Mark, you are confusing it with prolonged ripeness. Alex I like all Bordeaux. I still mean that 2003 in many cases has scorched fruit. Maybe a little opening of coronavirus restrictio...

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Phenolic ripeness is waiting to get same level of maturity of a grape inside and outside it. It's not waiting 2 weeks more to let acidity drop and sugar content increase. I'm not specially worried about high level of alcohol as it is what nature provides and if the wine has perfect balance and enou...

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Oh no, old subject again! Alex, it was more than 30 years since you arrived in Bordeaux. no? They didn't know then phenolic ripeness! Mark, An example of overripe vintage from 2000 to 2018, please? JimHow, You're wrong - 2016 is app. 1-1.5% less in alcohol than 2015. It's certainly not the vintage ...

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Mark, When I first arrived in the region, wines were, I kid you not, 11 and 11.5°. Meanwhile, the worst offenders of high alcohol wines seem to be on the Right Bank. I couldn't believe it when a friend telephoned me during the en primeur tastings and told me he had just come from Angélus, and menti...

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One of the things that haunts me a little, is that when I first started drinking Bordeaux, a major vintage was one that was ripe. They did not come along very often, perhaps three times a decade. Recently the average ripeness is much greater, we are probably seeing ripe and overripe vintages seven t...

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Very interesting. I used to buy wine based on my tastings en Primeur, and really did not like the 2003s. Bought a few bottles to cover verticals, and the Montrose, which did show well there. While the wine is not a disaster, and there are many who will love it a let more than I did, it is not a styl...

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1. Mouton 2016. 2. VCC 2005 3. Latour 2005 Honorable mention Pichon Baron 2005. I have high hopes of the Mouton, I can’t remember tasting a young better wine. The VCC quickly ind tasted last year from half bottle is beginning to fulfill some of the promise it showed young. I remember being mesmerize...

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Hmm! All these nice notes, and none of them gel with my experience. I just had both the Cos and Montrose (half bottle) for lunch recently. It was not a success; the Cos was sweet, big and almost totally lacking in character. Alcohol was intrusive, the finish reasonably long. Very disappointing. I le...

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I sold a large part of my own collection in September, and as I was looking at what I had kept, I found to my surprise much of it was Right Bank traditionaL Bordeaux. And the two largest holdings were Trotanoy and VCC.i am planning a couple of verticals to pick out a favorite, but my guess my prefer...

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Sadly I am more in Felix’s camp. All the problem’s of 2008 indicate that without the Chinese market, Bordeaux finds it hard to sell out in either a recession, or when it has a run of good vintages, which saturate the cellars of would be buyers. This is both. Sales in Hong Kong and China, anecdotally...

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Also please note, we are talking about the top 100 wines. The rest of the Bordeaux market has been struggling for years; apparently they have reached a crisis level.

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A couple of notes. People have mentioned the 2008 vintage; there were two very distinctive phases. The first before the Chinese showed up, was doom and gloom. In fact I was in Bordeaux in 2009, and there were certainly a few merchants who wondered if they would be in business by year’s end. A few of...

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Lafleur Petrus has a chunk of vineyard adjacent to Le Pin, which was incorporated around 2009. It may be vinified separately at some stage, but for the time being, it has certainly enhanced the quality of Lafleur Petrus. For me, Petrus is unique, which is basically what you are looking for in a trul...

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This. But Pape Clement '09 is worse. Both are in the highly extracted modern style. To be honest, neither are to my taste, but as you have noted, they certainly appeal to some, including critics.You may like them more than I do, but if your palate tends more to classic Bordeaux, I would keep away. ...

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New ownership, and the consultant, Emmanuel Cruse, who turned round Chateau D'Issan. Not sure when the takeover happened, but seem to remember somewhere around 2008. Under the previous regime, wines well worth avoiding.

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I recently went to a big Leoville Poyferre vertical and basically had the same impression as dstgolf above — the vertical made clear that its often a clumsy, overextracted, and oaky wine. I specifically did not like the 2009 which I found mediocre despite the reputation. I was actually quite surpri...

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Last time I tasted it, the 2009 Haut Bailly was still going strong. It's long term, and the two magnums I own will not be opened for at least fifteen years. I have been lucky enough to attend several verticals of Haut Bailly. For me, the sleeper was the 2008, for me one of the wines of the vintage, ...

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She's some family hanger on of the Mariani family I think. So has some connection to a bunch of Italian estates / importers and floats around the NYC/Bloomberg wine scene. In general, I think she's an contra indicator. I have known Elin for over 15 years, and never heard anything about any connecti...

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Not surprised at this. We did a DDC tasting not so long ago, which showed the splendid terroir of the chateau. My problem is Dererencourt. The most affable of all the big consultants, but also the one who makes the most anonymous wines. I was dragged into a tasting of all his wines, and the DDC rese...

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I think one of the most interesting things to come out of this tempest in a teapot is the fact that whether a château is classified or not makes very little difference to consumers. Even a Bordeaux nut like me, who knows the Médoc classification by heart, couldn't come close to citing all the châte...

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I have followed Giscours, since I tasted the 1979 which was my Eureka wine. It went through a bad patch post 1982, and after a change in ownership that wasn't really a change (long story and lots of law suits) it began to improve in the 1990s. But for me, it wan't until the 2010 that Giscours not on...

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Similar vintage to 2005 in recent vintages - 2010! Same ripening conditions, style and fruit. 2010 has fatter tannin, more grained and a bit sweeter. No diseases in neither 2005 and 2010, almost all the grapes went into Grand Vin. 2015 is close. One winemaker told me in 2006 - if you couldn't make ...

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You can see the change in attitude about en primeurs by looking at activity on the various wine boards. Years ago, there would be a daily breathless recap of the latest release prices. Several people would clamor to be first to report. Others would speculate as to how the ex-chateau prices would co...

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greatbxfreak wrote:Mark,

Where from you have a price for VCC 2017??

I can't see it has come out.

The best offers of 2017 imho - La Lagune, Meyney, Calon Segur, Pichon Comtesse and Les Carmes Haut Brion.

You are right; for some reason I thought I saw that it had been released.

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Alex, I did not get to taste the 2017s, but have read and talked to merchants, and can see absolutely no reason to rush out and buy any. By all accounts, it is inconsistent, and as a whole, less exciting that '15 and '16 both of which are currently available, and one can still buy at decent prices, ...

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I have had far less happy experiences with 1986 than you guys. I have found the back bone level of tannin to be disturbing and the majority of wines dour and unyielding, with no compensating freshness to offset them. There are a few wines I have enjoyed, but we did a tasting of 1986s and were underw...

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Thanks for the update Mark. Glad the Ducru shined. I have a couple left but have generally found it to be frustrating, albeit occasionally brilliant - like the day it shamed a 1989 Montrose. As the PLL star begins to fade the wotv accolades will in future be a battle royale between Latour, Mouton a...

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I had been planning a 1982 Bordeaux tasting for some time, and yesterday, over lunch it finally took place. Simple food, cheeses, charcuterie, and a Spaghetti Amatriciana. Slightly mixed bag; many showstoppers, but also a few sleepers that I had high expectations that were just fine, and only Beyche...

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Hell, it isn't hard to work out how the Europeans keep having wars amongst themselves!!! hehe. Clearly Diplomacy 101 is not a strong suit anywhere in that part of the World. Here is what I said, twice in some circumstance, in a (clearly failed) effort to clarify myself. I appreciate some here do no...

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I am finding it hard not to just raise my eyebrows: there are quite a few opinions which seem to suggest that they don't understand the life cycle of great Bordeaux vintages, and the comparison to 1986 is completely nonsensical. I don't think it's remotely nonsensical that 2005 has more in common w...

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I am finding it hard not to just raise my eyebrows: there are quite a few opinions which seem to suggest that they don't understand the life cycle of great Bordeaux vintages, and the comparison to 1986 is completely nonsensical. Also it seems that many are relying on a few wines without tasting enou...

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The 2005 is an incredibly good vintage, and way too young to be drinking. The over extracted Right Bank like Pavie should not be judged by the vintage, but by the producer. If a chef deliberately burns a roast, you shouldn't blame it on the quality of the meat. BTW, the Pichon Baron 2005 was one of ...

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The input of consultants varies enormously; some chateaux are heavily reliant, some not much. As an example, a favorite chateau of mine, Corbin, uses Michel Rolland's company but in a very limited way in the vineyards. It still counts as a Rolland consultancy. Figeac is also managing to work well wi...

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...at the convention.

On its twentieth anniversary, I was thinking of doing a really comprehensive tasting of Right Bank and Graves, but it seems that a large percentage of the wines are not showing well. Should I postpone?

Thanks

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The 1998 might have been a Perse wine, but the consultant at the time was Alain Raynaud not Michel Rolland. I have consistently liked this wine and on one occasion it was so profound I bought a case of it. This wine is atypical of the Perse era, and will surprise you if you are expecting a typically...

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I am a unashamed fan of Giscours. In fact the 1979 was my Eureka wine. Brilliant wines in the 1960s and 1970s, serious decline after 1982, and it took new ownership and a total renovation before the wines began to get back to their former glory, and even then it took well over a decade. The 2010 was...

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Thank you for this. I heard the sad news from an old friend, and we spent a good half hour talking about our memories of him. An elegant, old fashioned man, my friend used the word "courtly" which works for me. Quietly he with Veronique Sanders oversaw the renaissance of one of the great c...

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A really lovely guy; superb palate, endless enthusiasm, and I feel lucky to have known him.

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It is definitely more bell pepper than the herbal note one finds in other vintages of Lalande notably 1986 and 1996. My guess is that the Petit Verdot, notoriously hard to ripen in Bordeaux, was a fraction off, but the note is slight now and the wine is to my mind, enhanced by it. It is not the wine...

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I worried about the level of greens in the PL 2000 when I tasted it from barrel, and I sill think it is a touch high, but there is so much good stuff elsewhere that it is a tiny flaw. Not so Sociando, which is bell pepper in the extreme, with little room for much else.

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