I’ve been enjoying the 2010 Tertre Daugay [St Emilion] the last couple of evenings, slightly saddened knowing that this label is no more. The vineyards, along with l’Arrosee and Grand Pontet’s, have now been absorbed into a Dillon family brand - Quintus. But this final Tertre Daugay is a good last hurrah, with full on max volume style, that probably peaked in consumer interest a half decade earlier. At age 15 it’s still dark, fleshy, with licorice and incense on the nose, then plums on the palate. The back label stated 15.5% abv, very high for the AOC, and if served too warm might taste hot. I find it to still show a tannic structure, with a long finish. The wine writer Stephen Brook finds this year ‘rustic’ but it feels more ‘international’ to me but we all have different tastes/descriptors. According to the back label, there was 4200 cases made, with a blend of 82% merlot / 18% cab franc, with yields of 32 hectolitres / hectare, from argile/calcaire soil. I like this grippy modern right bank and it has plenty of life ahead of it. From what I understand this was not their style previously but perhaps ownership tried different approaches before selling up.
Overall I’d slot this into the B+ zone.
PS: It can be hard to find information on defunct estates, but some writers include them in their reference books. Even more amazingly is how good I have found that AI models (like Gemini 2.5) are for cross checking. My personal observation is these AI tools are about 90% correct when digging into the history of wines / vintners / vineyards etc. That’s impressive.
PPS: The back label - in small print - notes Quintus SAS. Perhaps the vineyards were sold lock, stock, and barrel with the inventory as well? From everything I understood the capstone 2010 vintage was made by the former owners, who were involved with La Gaffeliere.