TN: 2003 Pontet-Canet - closed?

[HarryKaris]

NO I am not always drinking CdP's ........

Together with the 2003 Montrose and Cos I purchased a case of this with splits and regulars...Liked it very much in the beginning and about time to re-taste.

Had this one from split.
Cassis nose with tobacco and toast and vanilla.
Full bodied with silky black currants and although well flavored I think not very intense mid palate - missing some punch. Well balance and long finish very spicy but ending a bot dry. At this level 'a just outstanding wine' definitely lacking expression.
I wonder who else had this wine lately and their experience.....

Bordeaux-Harry

[JimHow]

Harry, that wine started to shut down quickly about a year after it was released. The last time I had it was two years ago when we hosted Alfred Tesseron in NYC, and it was definitely in an awkward state at that point. I've been following its progress on cellartracker and other sites, and there seems to be a large range of opinions about its current state, with some loving it and some hating it, although I've seen notes where it has been deemed closed on Day One but delicious on Day Two. I am not planning on opening my bottles for another decade.

[alchemeus]

Harry (and Jim),

No idea. 2003 was the weirdest vintage I ever tried young. Heck, haven't even had one in a year or so. Honestly, just didn't care for it. So different from other first release tries. Personnal palate only. Just answered so if you didn't like it you'd have company.

[ChrisW]

Harry,

I had this wine from a regular bottle around 2 months ago. I decanted the wine around 3 hours before we started to consume it and maybe this did the trick. The wine was quite good, especially in the nose. The finish was more balanced and enjoyable than I expected, but I doubt a bit whether it has the density to become a real superstar in 10 years time. However, its performance was good enough to convince me to buy an additional case. On my very subjective scale I rated it 93-94 pts.

Chris

[William P]

The PC 03 was my first wine note on new board. I found this bottle to be slightly tamer than the one I had a year ago. It was a different wine on day two very muscular with excellent concentration. I have no worries that this will be a super wine in ten, well maybe 15 years. It at the beginning of its evolutionary process.

[DavidG]

This was the wine that Jim went nuts over shortly after release. He did a lot of "enabling" and convinced me to try a bottle. I liked it enough to buy a whole case, something I rarely do. Here's Jim's post, entitled "Buy as much 2003 Pontet Canet as you can":

From: JimHow (Original Message) Sent: 8/3/2006 12:55 PM

There have been certain wines over the years that have captured the imagination: 1983 Palmer, 1986 Mouton, 1989 Lynch Bages, 1990 Montrose, etc., etc.

Prediction:

2003 Pontet-Canet will join the pantheon of legendary Bordeaux.

This wine will catch the experts, connoisseurs, and investors by surprise.

In the past decade, Pontet-Canet has quietly risen in quality to the level of first and second growth wines. Not everyone realizes that yet. In 2003, it has reached unsurpassed heights, and is a candidate for wine of the year.

It is currently selling in the $60 range (Wine Exchange, Garnet, mags for $125 at Wine House).

I believe there were only something like 6,500 cases of this wine produced in 2003 (Sociando Mallet made 24,000). (Does anyone know what the normal production is for Pontet Canet?)

At $60.00, the 2003 Pontet-Canet is being gobbled up fast. It is a massively rich wine with strength, balance, ripeness, stunningly ripe tannins, a monumental finish... an absolutely classic Pauillac. Breathtaking, actually.

It is soon going to dawn on people that this estate is producing wines of Mouton-Rothschild-level quality. That secret can only be kept for so long, before Pontet Canet joins the ranks of estates like Pape Clement and others and will be selling for $150 out of the chute.

Buy as much of the very limited world supply of 6,500 cases of this stunning wine before it is quickly gone, before you are forced to pay several times its current $60 pricetag in the years ahead!

Here's my most recent note from 2 years ago:

2003 Pontet Canet: dark purple, nose of cassis, burnt earth, road tar, with time some hints of anise, full body, starts very tannic but develops over 2-3 hours into lush fruit, some layering, mellowing of tannins, excellent balance, medium finish, excellent now but will be much better in 5 years as it develops complexity (12/16/06)

I am not surprised that this wine is shut down now. It was heading in that direction 2 years ago. A lot of top end Bdx go to sleep within a year of release (if they're not already closed), and stay that way until they re-emerge around age 8-10. I still have 10 bottles remaining from that case, and I'm letting them sleep another 3 years before popping the next one.