Saturday night dinner: Crazy, man.

[JimHow]

...

[DavidG]

Love to see the pictures of all the happy people Jim, thanks for posting!

[Jay Winton]

Sitting on our porch in Kauai. So much fun to read about the dinners. Looks like another great weekend!

[SF Ed]

What a fantastic evening! As you can see from all the pictures, a good time was had by all. And just outstanding wines. I thought last year's Main Event was untouchable, but this year was even more amazing.

It is very clear that 1989 was a great year in Bordeaux, both right and left bank. The wines have loads of fruit, good balance, and have shed most of their tannins. They are in a great place to drink now, with many wines that are still improving. I have none in my cellar but I can't remember a horizontal tasting like this with such consistency of quality.

I liked Ian's structure for evaluating the wines, so I've copied it but changed some of the order around

Corked wines

Haut-Brion - what a shame. Pretty great that it was the only badly corked wine I tasted all night.

All wines 1989 unless otherwise noted

Wines not tried:

Cos D’Estournel
Grand-Puy Lacoste
Pichon Lalande 1986
Certan De May 1995
Haut-Bages Liberal
La Tour Blanche 1988
Climens
Guiraud
Figeac 1979
Canon
Gruaud-Larose
Lynch-Bages (bottle)


Unrateable:

Yacuchaya 2003 - ringer (Howard put it in for a joke - it wasn't awful, but it was a classic South American fruit bomb with tons of oak. Enjoyable in context but this wasn't it)

Good wines:

Tertre-Roteboeuf - I agree with Ian that it was tired. Pretty good that only one wine out of all of these was over the hill.

Very good wines:

Lynch-Bages (magnum)
Le Gay
La Dominique
Pichon Baron 1996
La Lagune
Rauzan-Segla
Palmer - I heard there were two bottles and one was much better than the other. I clearly tasted the weak bottle.

Excellent wines:

Talbot
Lafleur De Gay
Haut-Bailly
Rieussec
Ausone
Leoville-Lascases

Outstanding wines:

Montrose
Petrus - of course its great, but I didn't think it was better than much of what we drank. I was lucky enough to drink a 1989 Petrus a few weeks ago that showed much better.
Pichon Baron
Angelus
Lynch-Bages 1996

Exceptional (even better than outstanding) wines:

Yquem

Phenomenal wines:

La Mission Haut-Brion - clearly the best red wine of the night for me, but needs 10-20 years to reach its peak

Sensational wines:

1959 Yquem - unbelievably great and blew away the 1989. What an amazing thing to drink. Stuart brings these treasures year after year, and every year I am in awe of both the wines and his generosity.

[DavidG]

Sounds like there was plenty of evidence that, despite bottle variation, 30 years out is not over the hill for well-stored Bordeaux from a good year. I'm not surprised.

[JimHow]

We missed you my man but toasted you.
Nicola gave one of his greatest speeches ever, complete with Paul McCartney love song lyrics to John Lennon.
It was an absolutely spectacular weekend.
I'll be in the DC area in the next month or so, we should round up some of the mid-Atlantic subchapter for a Bordeaux rendezvous.

[JimHow]

The 1989 vintage is still very young, even I believe many of the wines could benefit from a blanquito or two.
Although, I will say that that 1989 Petrus was immense. The finish just went on and on. Breathtaking.
When we had it at a Stuart dinner a while back (I think Tom brought it?) it was very closed.

[JimHow]

And that '59 d'Yquem.
OMG.
I shamelessly went back up to Stuart and begged for a second pour.

[JimHow]

The 1989 Lynch Bages was brilliant.
I exerted executive authority and poured myself a large pour from the magnum.
At first it was closed like a drum. I kept it in my glass for the whole evening.
It took about four hours, but by the end of the evening it was immense.
Toward the end of the night I also took a pour from one of the two 750s, it was also brilliant from that format.
What a treat.

[JimHow]

A few of the Denverites. These people were super nice, we felt very welcomed into their town.

[DavidG]

Perfectly stored 1989 Lynch Bages is still young. Some of the bottles I've bought on the secondary market have been better/more developed than ones that have been in my cellar since release.

Jim email me some dates. If we're in town we'll definitely get together.

[JimHow]

I'm working on it David, hope to get together!

[Comte Flaneur]

What a fantastic evening! As you can see from all the pictures, a good time was had by all. And just outstanding wines. I thought last year's Main Event was untouchable, but this year was even more amazing.

It is very clear that 1989 was a great year in Bordeaux, both right and left bank. The wines have loads of fruit, good balance, and have shed most of their tannins. They are in a great place to drink now, with many wines that are still improving. I have none in my cellar but I can't remember a horizontal tasting like this with such consistency of quality.

I liked Ian's structure for evaluating the wines, so I've copied it but changed some of the order around

Corked wines

Haut-Brion - what a shame. Pretty great that it was the only badly corked wine I tasted all night.

All wines 1989 unless otherwise noted

Wines not tried:

Cos D’Estournel
Grand-Puy Lacoste
Pichon Lalande 1986
Certan De May 1995
Haut-Bages Liberal
La Tour Blanche 1988
Climens
Guiraud
Figeac 1979
Canon
Gruaud-Larose
Lynch-Bages (bottle)


Unrateable:

Yacuchaya 2003 - ringer (Howard put it in for a joke - it wasn't awful, but it was a classic South American fruit bomb with tons of oak. Enjoyable in context but this wasn't it)

Good wines:

Tertre-Roteboeuf - I agree with Ian that it was tired. Pretty good that only one wine out of all of these was over the hill.

Very good wines:

Lynch-Bages (magnum)
Le Gay
La Dominique
Pichon Baron 1996
La Lagune
Rauzan-Segla
Palmer - I heard there were two bottles and one was much better than the other. I clearly tasted the weak bottle.

Excellent wines:

Talbot
Lafleur De Gay
Haut-Bailly
Rieussec
Ausone
Leoville-Lascases

Outstanding wines:

Montrose
Petrus - of course its great, but I didn't think it was better than much of what we drank. I was lucky enough to drink a 1989 Petrus a few weeks ago that showed much better.
Pichon Baron
Angelus
Lynch-Bages 1996

Exceptional (even better than outstanding) wines:

Yquem

Phenomenal wines:

La Mission Haut-Brion - clearly the best red wine of the night for me, but needs 10-20 years to reach its peak

Sensational wines:

1959 Yquem - unbelievably great and blew away the 1989. What an amazing thing to drink. Stuart brings these treasures year after year, and every year I am in awe of both the wines and his generosity.

The 1959 Yquem, how could I have omitted that. New category:

Epic:

1959 Yquem

[Chateau Vin]

Sounds like a convention of EPIC proportions....

[JimHow]

Indeed it was. You gotta join us sometime CV!

[JimHow]

Bordeaux.

[JimHow]

A solemn moment before the drinking of the reds.

[JimHow]

Nalan, Michael, and Ted at the end of the night.

[JimHow]

Julia, Stuart, Kathy.

[JimHow]

Julia with Brendan, Ian, and Patrick.

[Chateau Vin]

Indeed it was. You gotta join us sometime CV!

I will Jim. Need to meet all the nice people...