BWE DC '09: Saturday wines and TNs

[DavidG]

Here's my best shot at what was drunk Saturday at Charlie Palmer's. I know it is far from complete. Hopefully others will pile on with what they remember.

Champagnes and Whites
85 Diebolt Vallois Bland de Blancs - SDR
88 Veuve Clicquot Rare (2) - Werner
MV Laurent Perrier Grand Siecle - DBG
NV Henriot Brut Rose - DBG
?? Dagenau Silex - Nic

Blind Tasting Wines
82 Certan de May (2) - SDR
82 Pichon Lalande (2) - SDR
85 Leoville Las Cases (2) - SDR
85 Margaux (2) - SDR
89 La Fleur de Gay (2) - SDR
89 Lynch Bages (2) - DBG

Dinner Wines
34 Leoville Barton - Michael P
82 Canon - SDR & Kathy
82 La Lagune - Stefan & Lucie
82 Leoville Barton - Blanquito
82 Leoville Barton - Winona Chief
82 Leoville Poyferre - HM$ & Lisa
82 Leoville Poyferre - Stefan & Lucie
82 Sociando Mallet - HM$ & Lisa
82 Talbot - DBG
83 Gruaud Larose - Winona Chief
83 Gruaud Larose - RickJ
83 Palmer - Werner & Chris
83 Pichon Lalande - Werner & Chris
85 Gruaud Larose - Jim How
85 Gruaud Larose - Tom & Gail
85 Mouton - SDR
85 Pichon Lalande - Jim How
85 Pichon Lalande - Tom & Gail
86 Ducru Beaucaillou - JC Northway
86 Ducru Beaucaillou - Stefan & Lucie
88 Haut Brion - Nic
88 La Lagune - Jay & Peggy
88 Lynch Bages - JC Northway
89 La Lagune - Jay & Peggy

Sweeties
59 Suduiraut - SDR
69 Lafaurie Peyrauguey
90 Filhot Crème du Tete - HM$ & Lisa
95 Yquem (2) - Winona Chief

[DavidG]

The favorite wine of the blind tasting, by a wide margin, was the '82 Pichon Lalande.

Second place was close between '82 Certan de May and '89 Lynch Bages. The Certan de May squeaked by on a split decision, but I had the Lynchas #2 on my card (after the '82 Pichon). Despite some fairly effective misdirection by my wife (who actually knew nothing about which wines were which, but Jim was looking desperately for cluse), Jim saved himself from any embarrassment by voting the '89 Lynch as his favorite He then went on to declare by dictatorial decree that it won the tasting. Impartial poll watchers know better, however...

Michael P was the hands-down expert in identifying the wines blind - he nailed all the vintages, all the R vs L bank, and 4 or 5 out of 6 wines exactly. Not an easy trick even though all the Chateaux names were listed, no one knew which 2 were the '82s, which 2 were the '85s, and which 2 were the '89s. Peggy Winton came in second, with no one close to her. Werner came in third (I mis-scored his sheet initially and had him back in the pack), edging out Tom in DC by one point. But everyone was pretty well clustered together within a few points after Michael and Peggy. People in general were pretty good about identifying R vs L bank - better than they were at picking all of the vintages correctly. And almost no one was very good at identifying specific wines. But even though we weren't sure of exactly what we were drinking until the reveal, we were all pretty sure it was damn good stuff. Many many thanks to Stuart for supplying almost all of the blind tasting wines.

[DavidG]

The '34 Leoville Barton was still alive. Not by a lot, but it was a treat to experience it. Some thought it was vile, I don't think anyone thought it belonged to that magical club of immortal wines that seem to retain vibrancy forever. But there was still fruit there and some echos of past complexity. Color was orange and pretty clear until we got to the last half of the bottle, at which point I'm sure the sediment had been stirred up. It was served pop (well, it was a 2-man collaboration between Michael and me to get the cork out in one piece) and pour. Fill was mid shoulder. What fruit was there was gone within 45 minutes.

[DavidG]

Of the stickies, I was a HUGE fan of the '59 Suduiraut. Perfectly mature, beautiful balance, really at the top of its game. The '95 Yquem was also awesome, and in another 10-20 years will probably be better than the Suduiraut, but right now it is still a baby - a massively endowed baby to be sure, but lacking the co-ordination and elegance of maturity. The '90 Filhot Creme de Tete was fun to drink but clearly the most sugary of the bunch. I liked the '69 Lafaurie initially on opening, but it seemed to fall apart within 30-60 minutes.

I'll try to add some impressions of the dinner wines and blind tasting wines as they come to me.

I should add that the staff at Charlie Palmer was pretty excited by all the wines. They were taking pictures of the bottles, and we made sure they had a chance to taste some of the stuff.

[Blanquito]

I plan to write up some more general notes, but I want to chime in here on the Sauternes in the meantime, given how terrific they were... You notes of the stickies match mine identically, David. While all 4 stickies were low-90 point wines (at least), I was mesmerized by the '59 Suduiraut, simply mesmerized. It was close to my WOTN, and only the Yquem gave it any competition. I was really surprized at how youthful the '59 was, not young, but also showing no signs of oxidation or madierazing

[JimHow]

All kidding aside, I am amazed that wine 2B, which turned out to be the Lynch, was not the winner. I am really wondering if there was some variation in the bottles because my 2B was far and away ahead of any of the others. Also, numerous people I talked to also had 2B as their clear winner. There must have been some serious groupthink going on in the other direction over on Howard Spector's table!

Off to court today, will post notes/observations on a tremendous weekend later on.

[DavidG]

I'm in SF and don't have all my notes, but I do have the spreadsheet from the tasting.

I did compare the two bottles of each wine when I decanted them. I didn't think there was any difference between them or for any of the other wines except the '89 La Fleur de Gay. One of those was slightly corked and very muted. That's why there was a short pour of that wine - I didn't pour from the corked bottle.

For those who want the details, here's the breakdown of the voting (I received 19 score sheets with decipherable rankings). This isn't Minnesota, and the vote wasn't close. The '89 Lynch received only 3 first place votes. The '82 Pichon Lalande got 9, and the '82 Certan de May got 5. The total points for Lynch and Certan de May put them almost in a dead heat for 2nd place, but both were well behind the '82 Pichon.

Now, If Jim is reporting more than 3 first place votes for Lynch, it means someone is telling him something different than they wrote on the score sheet, or that they didn't get the ranking system printed on the score sheet (first = 1, worst = 6). Or that good ole incorrigible Jimmy LB How is re-emerging in an attempt to create some post-fight spin.

Maybe I should have had an independent auditor check the ballots...

Here's the breakdown of the voting:

Master Score Sheet: BWE DC '09 Blind Tasting: Bordeaux of the '80s
Wine: Firsts Seconds Thirds Fourths Fifths Sixths Points
1A 1985 Leoville Las Cases 0 2 8 2 3 4 39
1B 1985 Margaux 2 2 2 5 5 3 39

2A 1989 La Fleur de Gay 0 0 3 3 5 8 20
2B 1989 Lynch Bages 3 8 1 1 3 3 55

3A 1982 Certan de May 5 2 4 6 2 0 59
3B 1982 Pichon Lalande 9 5 1 2 1 1 73



Rules: 5 points awarded for each first place vote, 4 for seconds, 3 for thirds, 2 for fourths, 1 for fifths

The table looked right in the Post Reply window, but it came out munged when it posted.

[JimHow]

I had 2B as the far and away clear favorite, but I thought it was the Pichon Lalande, so I gave 3B my first place vote, which I thought was the Lynch. And Nick and I were rounding up conspirators to identify and vote for Lynch. I think if we hadn't mis-identified the best wine of the night-- which was clearly 2B-- Lynch would have won hands-down.....

[JimHow]

[JimHow]

By the way, my memory could be wrong, but I believe the owner of the "Miami Five" stable picked '89 Lynch as his favorite....

[JimHow]

The most hilarious part of the evening was when Peggy, sitting to David's right, started hand-signalling to me to pick 3-A.

Blanquito, who was also in on the conspiracy, and I were completely confused at that point because we had that pegged for the right banker that it was. But surely David's wife would know the identity of the '89 Lynch, right?

Wrong! She was merely signalling to us what her favorite wine was, throwing us into complete and utter confusion....

It was a classic moment when, after several minutes of hand-signaling from Peggy across the table, blanquito and I almost instantaneously realized that she was not in fact disclosing to us the identity of the Lynch, but rather giving us her favorite wine of the night... setting off a mad scramble to change our votes yet again....

[DavidG]

So you're saying you fixed the fight but bet on the wrong fighter? OK...

[JimHow]

I put all the vintage and all of the wines together-- in other words, I guessed the LLC was an '85, the Margaux was an '85, the Pichon Lalande was an '82, etc. I just didn't identify any of the wines correctly!

Most people I talked to identified the first flight as 1985. And having concluded that the '85s were Margaux and LLC, I picked those two wines in the first flight. But I got them switched because Jon Northway thought 1A had the better nose, so I went with Margaux.

One thing that I predicted going into the tasting may have ended up being the case. I predicted that the '82s from Stuart's cellar would be youthful, and they certainly were, so much so that I mixed them up wth the '89s.

Again, all kidding aside, I'm amazed 2B didn't win, I thought it blew everything else away. And, hey, beating out the likes of LLC, and Margaux, and company ain't nothing to be ashamed of!

[Winona Chief]

It just goes to show that everyone has their own sense of taste. As for myself, I thought the 1982 Pichon Lalande and 1989 Lynch Bages were just about even and were head and shoulders above the other wines in the blind tasting.

Chris Bublitz

[sdr]

By the way, my memory could be wrong, but I believe the owner of the "Miami Five" stable picked '89 Lynch as his favorite....

I didn't turn in a score sheet since I felt I had an unfair advantage and would surely get almost everything right - especially since I had tasted all 6 of the contestants numerous times over the years.

My favorite was 3B ('82 Pichon-Lalande), which I was very confident was the '85 Margaux, even using a term in my notes I borrowed from stefan - "Margauxberry" - to describe the fragrance.

I got all the flights wrong but since I knew which wines were from which flights I couldn't score a perfect zero.

~stuart

[JimHow]

Thank you again Stuart for providing the "Miami Five," and to David for bringing the beloved '89 Lynch, the wines were showing brilliantly!

[DavidG]

Chris, I ranked them similarly: the '82 Pichon was my favorite, followed by the '89 Lynch, and both of them were clearly a step up from the other wines. Though most of the others were still low-mid 90-pointers for me. Just that the Pichon and Bages were high 90-pointers.

I didn't count my ranking in the voting, since I really did know which wine was which. I may have been influenced by that knowledge - '82 Pichon Lalande and '89 Lynch Bages have both been among my favorite Bdx for a long time. Knowing what they were did not reduce my enjoyment of them in the least.

Stuart, thank you again for such a generous contribution. Looking back at the lists of all of the wines, similar thanks to everyone who participated. There was a lot of good stuff drunk last Thursday, Friday, and Saturday! I was impressed that the staff at Charlie Palmer, and even the sommelier, was taking pictures of some of the bottles. They were into it. Despite having a good wine list, Charlie Palmer carries exclusively American wines. So they don't see stuff like this in the restaurant.

[Rick]

I really enjoyed the sauternes

the 59 Suduiraut was really special, the 69 Lafaurie Peyrauguey was interesting and the 90 Filhot Crème du Tete was also terrific because I have had the 95 Yquem a few times and ordered 6 upon returning to my room quite late in S Beach I passed on trying this again

There were so many good wines and only so much time or ability to try them, a field of riches,
My favorates and i probably only tried half the wines
82 Leo Poy
83 Palmer
85 Mouton
89 and 82 LaLagune
82 Pichon Lalande

Now i am laughing looking at the above list - who would not love each of these wines

i would have a hard time picking between the 82 PL and 82 LP for the red WOTN. The 82 Leo Poy was so dark and full of fruit I was just amazed at this one - a real surprise. The 59 Suduiraut was right up there and probably was my WOTN

Thanks to everyone for bringing such nice wines

Rick

[JimHow]

I really liked the '83 Pichon Lalande.
I think I ended up drinking about six of the wines on Saturday night, as usual I end up spending more time talking than drinking!

[hm$]

Bill and I both brought the '82 Poyferre, and I tasted them side by side. they were shockingly similar despite the fact that mine was an auction buy last year and his was bought locally in 1985.

I got the vintages right but only the Lalande nailed down as far as the wines. Even the vintage guessing was hard because Bill, Rick and Nick were all telling me I had the 89/82 vintages backward. But I have had the Lalande 2xx in the past year and it always amazes me.

I though the '82 Canon was quite good, not mentioned above.

As always it was great to see everyone.

hm$

[stefan]

Yeah, my biggest failure was thinking that the '82s were so young that they had to be from '89! Not that I did well on anything...

stefan

[DavidG]

I'll second that mention of '82 Canon - excellent stuff. There were a bunch that I never got around to trying, but even so I enjoyed a multitude of winners.

[Blanquito]

Stefan, a number of us my table thought the 1982's were markedly younger than the '89's as well.

For the record, I think my BWE bonafides are now secure as I had the 2B as my favorite wine (even though I thought it was the Lalande '82; I turned and apologized to Jim thinking I had let his Lynch down). The 3B (the true '82 Lalande) was only a hair behind the Lynch in my book and I recall thinking that it would eventually surpass the 2B/Lynch.

My other favorites in order (no notes and I didn't taste everything):
Talbot '82
Leoville Poyferre '82
Conseillante '70
Certan de May '82
Gruaud '83

I need to get better at pacing myself for such big tastings. My taste buds (and liver, no doubt) got a bit overwhelmed, unt the stickies road in to revive them.

[JimHow]

Yes, when I tasted 2B, and I think Blanquito will confirm this, my first words were, "Wow, I'm not sure my Lynch is going to be able to beat this '82 Pichon Lalande!"

[Blanquito]

Quoth the BD: "Wow, I'm not sure my Lynch is going to be able to beat this '82 Pichon Lalande!"

Verily, these fabed words were uttered by the BD, with some chagrin I may add.

[JimHow]

Thank you for the corroboration blanquito, you are a fine BWEer indeed!

[DavidG]

This is one reason I love blind tastings. You couldn't make this stuff up!

[aimeedogdogdog]

We walked in to the restaurant close to 6pm. I tried to have a few sips of champagne before doing the blind tasting. 4 bottles of champagne and the two '88 no where to be seen. I was panic a bit because it would be late to open them now. I ran to Jim (whom I asked for a favor to carry the wines to the restaurant for us as we knew we would be late) and asked for the wines. What a great relief when Jim said the two '88 were drunk in the first 10 miniutes! Phew. What's the point to carry wines across the country if they were not consumed? I tasted this wine before. It tasted great and that's why I decided to bring them to the convention.

Now on to the blind tasting:

First Flight-- I instantly figured out the '85 Margaux with its margauxberry fragrance, which was suble at first and then opened up more into the late hour. The other wine was likable too.
Second Flight -- They were the oldest of all in the blind tasting and I thought the right banker was kind of muted and flat. The Lynch was closed at first and only opened up later on (if you drank it all before it opened up you would probably not be able to tell how great it was.) The finish on the Lynch was amazing once it's opened up.
Third Flight -- They were the youngest and which led me into thinking it's the '89 (logical thinking but obviously it was wrong.) The '82 Lalande was awesome. It was so young but yet absolutely delicous. It's one of those rare and few complete wines -- spherical and penetrating. Amazing long finish. This wine under good condition would never get old. It only gets more mature and more mature, but never gets old.

My ranking:
1st -- Lalande
2nd -- Lynch
3rd -- Margaux
4th -- Las Cases
5th and 6th -- the right bankers

Werner

[JimHow]

This is one reason I love blind tastings. You couldn't make this stuff up!

What is wrong with confusing the '89 Lynch with the legendary RMP100 '82 Pichon Lalande, David? I consider it a badge of honor! I know it didn't come in first, but to me this tasting confirmed the '89 Lynch's place in the pantheon of great Bordeaux from the past fifty years. It held its own with some pretty spectacular wines from an outstanding cellar.

The Lynch has been a great fighter, a great representative of the classicism that is the hallmark of traditional Bordeaux. I think it will be time to retire this great warrior from competition in Chicago in 2010, where it all began, by uncorking the 3L!

[DavidG]

Jim - There's nothing wrong with confusing '82 PLL and '89 LB. I think it shows that great wines rise to the top in these settings. I doubt I would have been able to identify any of them any better than the vast majority of us. And I'm not surprised that your favorite turned out to be the '89 Lynch. You've pretty consistently loved that wine.

Maybe my comment was misinterpreted. All I meant was that the format created a lot of fun buzz: guessing, second-guessing, looking for clues both in the glass and elsewhere. I wasn't sure if you were really trying to electioneer for the Lynch Bages or if you were just kidding. Either way I found the idea of trying to get people to vote for the Pichon while thinking it was the Lynch was pretty funny. The irony of that is what I was laughing at, not that you, or anyone, would get the wines mixed up.

[Tom In DC]

I loved the format! Jimmy "The Fight Fixer" How against the world? What's not to love? And with more ways to score than a scratch-off lottery ticket, the system gave everyone a chance to wine. I could explain my 4th place (after the recount, shades of Al Gore!) result, but Michael P. suggested that I might have been over-gaming the situation... Than again, who took home the honors???

Great fun, great Monday-morning quarterbacking opportunities...BRING ON CHI-CAH-GO!!!!

(And we still have more bottles of both fighters in the "Chez In DC Travesty", so don't even be thinking that '89 LB's fight days are over!!!)

Ciao,
Tom

[JimHow]

I was able to round up a small band of conspirators-- one from Quebec province and the other from Denver, Colorado, their identities shall remain confidential-- but the irony is that, by mis-identifying the Lynch and Lalande, I may have cost my fighter a second place finish, at the very least.

I still say one of those Lynches must have been better than the other-- which, by the way, would not be unheard of, we've seen bottle variation in that wine throughout its history-- because the 2B I had was without question the most expressive wine of the six for me.