Two St Juliens

[stefan]

Last night with Judd's grill of hanger steak, mushrooms and vegetables we drank an oldish and a youngish St Julien.

The 1988 Gruaud Larose is in perfect shape and has tertiary overtones of hay, sage, and alfalfa. The tannins are soft but enough for the steak, and the red fruit is flavorful even on the tonsils. This is an elegant, old style St Julien. For my taste this bottle was better than the excellent 1986 and 1978 we drank recently at Jim's.

The 2000 Talbot is, not surprisingly, more powerful than the Gruaud with tannins that are still aggressive. The fruit is darker. While very good, I think the Talbot should be blanquitoed once or twice.

[DavidG]

Very nice stefan.

[JoelD]

My kind of wines. Thanks for the report as I have some of each in the cellar. DId this 88 have the Cordier funk? On a very good recent bottle of the 89, it did not. And although the wine was still great, it missed something that I was expecting and looking forward to.

[stefan]

Not funky, Joel, but nice overtones.