Three Old Bordeaux And Some Starters

Our Bellecour tasting group had one of those increasingly hard to replicate nights, where great provenance old bottles from our cellars were drunk and all bottles (three in this instance) showed spectacularly. Four guys, just under four hours, and a great time.

THREE OLD BORDEAUX AND SOME STARTERS - Bellecour. Wayzata, MN (9/26/2019)

• 1971 Moët & Chandon Champagne Cuvée Dom Pérignon Oenothèque - France, Champagne
  Dense and almost viscous, the 71 Oeno continues to drink wonderfully. A beautiful wine, not just a great champagne.
• 2011 Coche-Dury Meursault Les Rougeots - France, Burgundy, Côte de Beaune, Meursault
  Classic Coche, with strong matchstick that never dissipated. This showed classic 2011 Meursault beauty, and was a very pleasurable bottle.
• 2014 Domaine Leflaive Puligny-Montrachet 1er Cru Les Combettes - France, Burgundy, Côte de Beaune, Puligny-Montrachet 1er Cru
  A beautiful bouquet, purity of fruit, and showing that 2014 vintage precision. Delicious.
• 1925 Château Haut-Brion - France, Bordeaux, Graves, Pessac-Léognan
  Opened as dinner started, and drunk over three hours. Beautiful classic cedar, with touches of graphite, dry earth, and dry herbs. As it opened, there was just a touch of green (in the good way), and a couple of us mentioned it was Pichon Lalande like. Sourced a while back by my friend via Linden Wilke, and a most proper bottle. The initial bottle from this parcel was shared with Jean-Philippe Delmas, who interestingly had not had the vintage (and felt it was quite proper). An amazing and rare treat these days to share old bottles like this.
• 1945 Château Mouton Rothschild - France, Bordeaux, Médoc, Pauillac
  At opening, there was just a touch of an odd note on the palate. We decanted the bottle and poured a small glass each, and the odd note blew off quickly. Classic Mouton to begin with cedar and earth. Then after roughly two hours, there were strong notes of mint and eucalyptus. And the wine, which started strong, simply got better and better over the three hour dinner. A beautiful bottle, procured many, many decades ago and very proper.
• 1947 Château La Mission Haut-Brion - France, Bordeaux, Graves, Pessac-Léognan
  A bottle in perfect shape from the first Steve Verlin auction at HDH. Decanted for sediment and first sips were terrific. Silky and somewhat sweet initially, that morphed into a brown sugary and even sweeter palate as it opened over the three hour dinner. Extremely pleasurable and all in all a fantastic bottle.

Posted from CellarTracker

great notes on 3 old bordeaux and the white didn’t suck either.

WOW Brad - '45 Mouton is one that I’d love to try but probably never will. Probably more from a sentimental viewpoint of WWII for me, but I’m glad to hear the wine was showing well.

Jerry, we were discussing that it likely will be the last 45 Mouton we drink, and certainly the last one that we have high confidence in the provenance.

What a treat to drink ancient Bordeaux treasures that aren’t fake. Congratulations, Brad.

Is the ‘45 Mouton the greatest Bordeaux of the twentieth century?

No wine ages as interestingly as Bordeaux IMO.

Wow, thanks for sharing. I can only hope someday to be able to partake in a tasting like that!!

Thanks for notes Brad, that is a crazy trifecta of BDX vintages that I can only hope to try one, much less three.

Interesting - I’m opening a '25 Pichon Lalande in November. Will be interesting to see whether there are any associations with Haut Brion;-)

What a sensational experience that must have been. Thanks for posting

Awesome set of wines Brad! We should drink more Bordeaux .

Green with envy over here. Thanks for the notes.