Executive Summary: choose wisely, because although some wines have become much more expensive to buy today, I can get the Cru Bougeois for an inflation-adjusted price equal to what I paid in 2001. However, I know the provenance and I don’t have to worry about whether someone is selling Katrina wine or wine that was stored under the staircase in the living room. The moral of the story is that, with a few exceptions, in Bordeaux at least, they got it right in 1855. Quality floats to the top and OK is just OK.
The long and boring version: In the summer of 2001, we were going on vacation to Costa Rica and I had just received a Bordeaux en primeur offering from Rochambeau wines (yes, the Steve Austin place 
) with copies of the RMP tasting notes. It was my reading material for the first leg of the flight. After having read articles about the wonders of the 2000 vintage in Bordeaux, I decides jump in with both feet, but having just spent most of my disposable income on plane tickets, I had no choice but to rein in my desire to buy high-level stuff. That, by the way, was a mistake, because I should have gotten the 200 Lafite, which has increased by a factor of ten.
I decided to buy inexpensive Cru bourgeois from each commune, based upon RMP’s highest rated wines that I could get for under $20. They have been lying quietly in my basement for more than two decades, with an occasional bottle opened just to check in on them. I am now in the midst of fixing my cellar inventory, so I decided to start opening these wines on a regular basis.
Yesterday, I opened a 2000 Ch. Fougas, which has the lowest current “value” on CT. $20 in 2001 is $38.05, I gave it a 90 minute decant and then followed it for 4 hours. It was solid and it had no flaws. Pleasant with resolved tannin and no bite. Light fruit but not a fruit driven wine. Did not have the complex flavors of RMP’s original TN, which as important in my selection process: The brilliant 2000 Fougas-Maldoror has a dense ruby/purple color and a nose of hot chocolate intermixed with black cherry jam, plums, and figs. The wine is dense, chewy, fat, and totally delicious. Some tannin in the finish is nearly obscured by relatively high levels of glycerin. Drink it over the next 10-12 years. A sleeper of the vintage. I did not find it dense and chewy at all after all of these years, with limited cherry jam, plums and figs.
Today the 2000 Fougas average price on Winesearcher is $43. Is it “worth” $43? It depends on what you like. I am not disappointed because it was reasonably pleasurable, but I can get wine for $43 that I find more pleasurable.
The others I have that I will open soon are Clos Rene, de Sales, d’Aiguilhe, La Fleur de Jague, Cantemerle, Cos Labory, Grand Mayne and d’Armailhac. An then there are my two splurges - 2000 Lacombes and d’Issan. The d’Issan, all of which I have open the bottle or to all of the years, it is excellent. I am partial to the Lascombes because I have had a lot of it because I used to buy it in the 1970s for almost pocket change, but I don’t believe it is as good as the d’Issan.
