Just thumbing through JG’s most recent review of BDX…View from the Cellar’s 2011 notes. I stumbled over the Pontet Canet review and almost decided to cancel the few remaining subscriptions I have and spend that “amount equal to one or two bottles of grand cru” on one or two bottles of grand cru. I am exhausted and frankly unable to follow these guys on their emotional roller coaster ride. Consider the following…
The 2007 Pontet-Canet is a thoroughly modern and uninteresting wine. The nose offers up an anonymous meld of pumped up black cherries, chocolate, smoke and toasty new oak.
vs
Château Pontet-Canet is making one of the most exciting wines in all of Bordeaux these days and their 2011 is one of the top wines to be found on the Left Bank.
Other than the concrete eggs I don’t see much difference…the guys at Pontet have strived to deliver great (bio) wine for quite a few years now. I accept that the 2007 might have had a bit too much oak or was over extracted but I can’t arrive at rationalizing the margin between a “77pt” rating and a “92pt” rating. I certainly don’t chase points but both the description and the score seem to tell me that “Pontet Canet has a flawed style / philosophy / approach / interpretation” in 2007 and in 2011 they are sensible and focused on ensuring they allow the wine to express its origins. That “margin” doesn’t exist, the 2007 review simply isn’t the truth.
I guess I am also feeling a little burned by the scores he gave to both Burg’s and Beaujo’s for 2009 only to turn around and poo poo all of those wines in favor of the 2010’s.
Anyone on this board thinking of starting up a newsletter please think hard about what you wrote in the past. At the very least write, “I got it completely wrong in 2007” before you continue to write “this estate is making the most exciting wines in all of Bordeaux these days”.
I want to vomit when I read this most recent review following my disappointment with the recent Burg and Beaujo reviews.
I’m with you on reviewers, but not sure why you’d expect JG to like the 2011 exactly the same as the 2007, unless you had tried both and found them to be very similar.
It’s possible JG blasted the '07 after a single whiff during a primary or awkward stage, which is my problem with all wine reviewers - they’re required to do a sufficient volume of work to fill their pages, and therefore by necessity they don’t spend enough time with any wine to really know it. So, unless they’re tasting blind, they make some calls considering producer and vintage. We can do that too.
To clarify, my problem is the difference in scores. “The most exciting winemaker in BDX” just a few years ago was apparently making “modern claret cocktails usually collapse in on themselves” just 4 years ago. Vintage differences should (or at least in my mind) be captured in the text. I don’t see any reference to a problem with the vintage which would explain the score. I can only read that there was a problem with the wine making.
His review of 2007 would have told me, “don’t buy wine from these guys regardless of the vintage” whereas the 2011 review tells me, “add these guys to your annual subscription list, they make good wine in the face of any adversity”.
My problem is the hyperbole used in 2007. It damages the reputation of what turns out to be 4 years later a very respectable estate.
Fair enough. You’re right in that such a swing in commentary about the producer deserves more discussion of what changed, or that there was a significant change.
You raise a very good point about looking back on what one previously said about a vintage from barrel. I have been regularly evaluating Bordeaux barrel samples since the 2003 vintage. I think the key is to take one’s subjective tastes into account. The emotional reply to a particular wine is part of that.
Your point about John praising 2009 Burg only to praise 2010 (more?) is interesting. But I can understand where he is coming from. I, too, really liked the red 2009s in Burgundy I had tried, but there was always this cloud hovering over them, the cloud of over-richness and lack of ideal freshness. I recall being in Burgundy during the 2009 harvest and Alex Gambal telling me “It is going to be hard for critics to say anything negative about 2009 because the weather was so ideal.” But then again, it was perhaps “too ideal” in the sense that the wines are sometimes “obvious” in comparison to 2010, at least that was the comparison I got when I tasted the same wine from Mugneret Gibourg, a Nuits St George, from 2009 and then 2010. The 2010 had more nuance, but the ripeness, too… I had a similar experience comparing two Pommards last month in Burgundy, with the 2010 exuding greater freshness while also being ripe and broad.
Furthermore, the whites in 2010 easily surpass the whites from 2009 on a general level.
As for Pontet Canet, I can understand where JG is coming from. As I wrote in my own notes on this superb 2011, it seems like Pontet Canet found a way in 2011 to be fresh, to exude iodine and seashell aspects that sometimes are lacking. It really made a spectacular wine in that sense, for the vintage. I recall not liking the Pontet Canet 2005 as much as, say, the Pichon Baron 2005, which came across as much more Pauillac-y, whereas the Pontet Canet had a certain layer of over-richness that kind of annoyed me as “modern”. I had a similar reaction to the 2003. Well, we are all human, so we cannot be perfect, but a call for consistency can only be a good call.
Hope this isn’t off-topic and I don’t mean to “pile on” JG, but his disdain for screwtops in the German reviews smacks more of personal preference than evaluation. He claims they add a metallic flavor or create permanent reduction. I know the screwcap topic has been discussed ad nauseam but is there really scientific or common belief that screwtops perform this way? I may not have the sharpest palate in the room but I haven’t experienced these types of flaws with screwtops.
This is my last issue of JG. I have benefitted from my subscription but it is time to move on. I visit a lot of domaines on my own and spend a lot of time discussing with merchants, sommeliers, writers and the rest (yeah, those guys actually squeezing the juice too!) and I am going to stay on that path. I owe the JG’s (and RP’s) of the wine world a lot, my taste has matured and I have learned how to think about what I am drinking thanks to them.
I have had the fortune to taste 2009’2, 2010’s (11’s, 08’s, etc) from numerous domaines here there and everywhere in France. I adored 2010 in barrel. I would have walked out of every domaine with their 2010 before I lifted a single bottle of 2009. Funnily the 2009’s show a different side in bottle and I have enjoyed them. Pressed to choose between the two I would stick to 2010. But 2009 is still very (very) good in a lot of cases.
My point (and I am doing an obviously bad job of making it!) is that a good domaine doesn’t make a “modern cocktail” one year and then experiences a metamorphosis in 12 months and becomes one of the most exciting wine makers in a region that produces almost as much wine as the US of A. Mugneret might have had made a BETTER 2010 but they didn’t suddenly go from making an oak soup to being the most terroir driven estate on the Cote.
Pontet have tuned their style, they have refined and focused. Got it (tasted it too). But they they haven’t gone from zero to hero overnight. I would have been as shocked (ok, a little more than almost as shocked) if he had given Pavie a good review.
Last weekend was Hospice du Rhone in Paso Robles. I was hanging around a lot of other winemakers, and I heard several people saying things like “winemaker X has really dialed back (their usual over the top winemaking style” in 2009 and 2010. Well, yeah, because 2009 and 2010 were cooler and wetter years. We got rain in both years during harvest. You’d have to try really hard to make over the top wines during those years (and by really hard, I mean using technology).
Most winemakers do not change their styles or their philosophies within the space of a year or two. I think you have to look at what the vintage gives you. If a critic notices a difference and attributes that to a change in winemaking styles, they are more than likely not looking at the big picture.
Your point is well taken. Mugneret perhaps did a better job in 2010, but I still like 2009. The 2009 is also a very fine vintage, I bought a bunch of Mugnerets from 2009, at least as much as I could get my hands on… There are less 2010s!
Similar with Pontet Canet. I did not “hate” some of their earlier vintages; I just found them less fresh than the 2010 (and 2011). Could 2009 be a sort of turning point with Pontet Canet, towards greater freshness? I am not certain…
I thought you were comparing the 2007 and the 2011 which would be a difference of 4 years? Have they changed their winemaking style? As anyone who subscribes to VFTC knows John is not a fan of big new oak influence. If they cut that way back over the 4 year period I could understand the about face. While I have no idea if that is the case it sounds that way from the 2 reviews.
I can think of Copain as a winery that has done a similar stylistic shift over the course of one year, let alone four.
Much depends upon what one expects of wine critics. If you expect a critic to deliver “The Truth”, the one absolute assessment, about every wine reviewed, you are bound to be disappointed. Well, maybe the hoarders are not disappointed, they just continue to believe “The Truth As They Read It” and don’t actually form their own opinions. But we are not dealing with that here. But I do think each of us who seeks to gain anything useful from a critic is obligated to put some considerable effort into it. The general review of a vintage, its quality and its character, should be more accurate than a review of a single wine. And a single wine can surely be very different in 2007 and 2011. Gilman is pretty transparent about his criteria, more so than any other critic I know of. He has only reviewed Pontet-Canet twice, just '07 and '11. Obviously, he felt the '07 was spoofed and the '11 was not. One or both could be wrong, but both might be correct according to Gilman’s criteria.
I don’t think Paul had a problem with the different vintage assessment. Wines from different vintages get different scores all the time. It was the broader commentary that was the problem.
I can’t speak to the specific wines as I haven’t had either vintage of P-C.
But it is certainly possible for a winery’s style to change dramatically over the course of 4 years. Over the last decade or so the Chateau has both converted to biodynamie and brought on M. Rolland as consultant. Both of those changes (particularly the latter) guarantee some degree of compass correction, so it is possible that things have gone from one side to the other.
I agree, though, that the wide disparity in comments made by Gilman beg an explanation from him.
Whether it is vintage, cellar technique or bottle variation if a critic has only reviewed a wine twice and he decides to change his position on the domaine’s overall performance I would appreciate a little bit of context. He didn’t say “they are making one of the most exciting examples of 2011”, he said “making some of the most exciting wine in BDX today” giving me the impression they have multiple vintages where they are really producing GREAT wine from vineyard to bottle. I have subscribed to VFTC for 2 years. I understand, appreciate and agree with JG’s criteria. But here I am wondering if he tasted but didn’t review PC in 2008 - 2010? JG seems to “know” that PC has been making some of the most exciting wines in BDX recently yet the only evidence I have of his experience with the domaine is a tasting note from 2007 that slams them for making a modern cocktail.
Just to be clear, I don’t mind a low score in a bad year and a high score in a good year…in fact I really don’t give a toss what score he gives…which is why I pulled the text from his review. I mind the fact that the most recent review of PC (2007) slams the domaine for being firmly placed in the modern camp and suddenly in the very next review available JG is fully behind this domaine as one of the most exciting in BDX. He took the time (and word count) to explain again why Pavie sucks. I get it, thanks. I am not paying for another diatribe on the sins of Perse. I would like some explanation offered on why PC has suddenly jumped up so dramatically in his opinion as a DOMAINE (nothing to do with vintage). Did he ask to taste the 2007 again? Or did he at the very least discuss with the owners what has happened in the last 4 years?
JG has a big blind spot for wines that may show unintegrated in youth but which tend to come together, for example, Malescot 2005. Does he ever go back and retaste these wines?
Contacting him directly is a mature approach to resolving the PC questions. Unfortunately I have let to many questions go unaddressed recently (completely my own fault, between work and a 20 month old daughter I have let my devoted attention to wine slip recently). My frustration with the gaps between articles started with the Beaujolais review for the 2010’s.
This line in the 2010 review surprised me, “While the 2009s are certainly still an impressive crop of wines, I find myself a bit less enamored to the style of the vintage than I initially thought I would, after having had a chance to taste through a wider selection of the best growers wines.”
JG changed his opinion of the 2009 somewhere between the recent review and the 2009 review, where he stated, “From my tastings of the vintage, which are not as in-depth as I might have hoped for if I had been able to make the trip over to Beaujolais this summer (and several producers have not yet shipped their 2009s over here to the states), certainly included enough 2009s to show that this is indeed another ripe and very, very high quality vintage. 2009 is clearly the best year in Beaujolais since the 2005s, with a great many of the wines stylistically resembling a bit the 2005 red Burgundies, with amazing depth of ripe fruit, striking signatures of soil, tangy acids, firm tannins and stunning length and grip.”
Please don’t misread the direction of my disappointment, it isn’t with the scores or the change of view on a winery between vintages or after a change in style…it has much more to do with the sudden and extreme shift in his opinion without much explanation, save a short script about the fact he has tasted more examples in the Beaujo article. It erks me that he says, “a fairly good number of 09 Beaujo’s also suffer from overripeness”. Why did he write one year earlier his tasting certainly included enough examples to show that 2009 is a ripe and very, very high quality vintage? Am I supposed to read sarcasm in both his negative and his positive reviews?