I’m organising the wine for my son’s wedding next year. One of the reds I’m considering is Larose Trintaudon.
Most of you probably know it, but for those that don’t, it’s a Cru Bourgeois situated a few miles inland from Pauillac and Saint Julien, close to Batailley and Du Glana, I think.
Larose Trintaudon is a huge estate, producing something like 1.3 million bottles a year and it’s sold in virtually every supermarket in France. In spite of the vast production, I’ve always found it to be pretty good and very reliable, as well as excellent value. I buy some every year. It’s a wine I often serve at low-key dinner parties or receptions, since it always goes down well: it tastes like a much better wine than it is, because without having the complexity of the big guns, it has quite a silky touch which flatters the palate.
Obviously I haven’t got the number of bottles needed for the wedding in my cellar but since I have the last few vintages I decided to organise my own tasting to select the vintage, before ordering direct from the château.
I chose 2014, 2015, 2016 and 2017:
2014: aromas of blackberry and wild strawberry, before quite a plump mouthful of blackcurrant, plum and blackberry, very suave and classical in style, still a little tannic, fresh, elegant and reserved. I had this a month a go so knew what to expect, but it’s a fine example of Larose.
2015: the bouquet is richer and deeper than the 2014, with prominent blackcurrant and plum. The attack is fuller too, quite a full-bodied mouthful of blackberry and blackcurrant, with at this stage just hints of plum and violet. Less elegant, more concentrated than the 2014, this needs another three to five years, but very promising indeed.
2016: notes of red cherry and cranberry, very bright and at first, rather disconcertingly so. The attack was just as odd, quite sharp notes of red cherry and cranberry, with a wave of redcurrant, none of the blacker fruit I was expecting. It took a couple of days to calm down and in the end, the bright flavours became quite enjoyable, but certainly the strangest Larose I have ever tasted - like a bio-dynamic experiment gone wrong.
2017: fresh notes of dark cherry and spring flowers, with quite a sappy mouthful of black cherry and blackberry, clearly not the finest vintage but with lots of easy-going charm.
For the long term, the 2015 was clearly the best. The 2016 needs revisiting in a couple of years time, but for the wedding, the choice was between the 2014 and 2017 - the 2017 has a very appealing brightness, but the 2014 is a lot more classy, so the 2014 will probably be the chosen wine. I had expected that it would, but the 2017 gave it a run for its money.
It was fun trying them together in ideal conditions, being able to drift from one vintage to another throughout several evenings. Apart from the odd 2016, it confirmed just how good the wines can be and why this estate is one of my bankers.
