There’s quite a lot of stuff out there. Pulling the first thing off my bookshelf that fits, I am dipping into Charles Walter Berry’s In Search of Wine, published in 1935 describing a wine buying journey around France. The Bordeaux chapter opens with Berry drinking a bottle of “1923 Cos d’Estournel … a pleasant enough wine, but much too old for its age”… The 1929 Haut Bailly, he writes a few pages later, will be excellent “in a few years”. Reviewing recent Bordeaux vintages, he classified 1888 and 1914 as years to “drink up quickly” and 1905 and 1907 as years to “drink up slowly”, and says that 1929 is “very good, but I cannot think it will be a vintage to last very long”.
Grabbing a more recent book, one finds Penning Rowsell writing in the early 1980s of the 1961s that “by the late seventies some of them have developed into at least mature wines and in some cases have shown signs of decline”.
Note that both of these texts come out of the British tradition, which favored older wines than the French tended to.
All of this is as much interesting for its salience to the evolving nature of connoisseurship and taste as it is for what is does or doesn’t tell us about the wines.
Overall my personal position (and I write this as someone who loves old wines, with Bordeaux in my cellar back to 1846) is that competently made wines from high-quality vine genetics in great terroirs and good vintages, devoid of masking flaws or coarse extraction, should already be manifestly great in their youth—and that means balanced, complex, characterful and, yes, pleasurable. Aging should be a choice, not an obligation, and one made that the wine may become even better, not in the hope that it may become less objectionable. 2022 seems to me a vintage, much as people described 1929s, that meets all these criteria unusually well.
Well said. I agree with caveats. Historically things were quite different. From what I’ve read, and recall hearing from previous generations that tasted now, historic vintages in their youth, years like 21,29, 47, 48, and 49, as well as all the 50s were fabulous on release. But years like 28, 45 and 61 were not charming. This is why you see so many 61s and only a few 59s in cellars and auctions today.
Historically you also need to look at the drinking habits in individual countries. French wine lovers drank them young, and still do. The British preferred aged wines.
Things changed in the 60s with the introduction of a myriad of chemicals to increase yields along with pesticides. Wines were often rustic and charmless.
Today, there is a realization that consumers do not have cellars, patience to wait, or the funds to stockpile wines waiting for maturity.
Climate change, viticultural adaptation, better focus on genetic material, gentler touches from start to finish in the cellars and you have wines that can be thrilling as well as pleasurable in their youth.
2022 is the most recent example balancing high-quality wines of character with the ability to be enjoyed in their youth, yet have the ability to age and evolve for decades.
Those that know me, know I’ve been saying this for years
I had the 2022 Comtesse at UGC. I thought it was currently undrinkable but might be excellent in 20+ years, when I will have no interest in it. I found it extremely astringent and lacking in elegance or finesse. I thought that the Baron was much better. The 2022 Comtesse seems to be rather controversial, as at least two other people who tasted it that day felt the same as I did, while some others thought it was the class of the tasting. Personally, my #1 was the Clos Fourtet, which I found currently drinkable and rather elegant. The tannin was not so fierce as to hide the positive aspects of the wine, which was the problem I had with the Comtesse. But reasonable minds may differ.
PS - I thought that the Sauternes were outstanding across the board.
Fascinating these variations of perception regarding 2022 PC.
„I have to say I agree with you Martin. I thought this was a stunning Pichon-Comtesse from barrel, and tasting it after bottling last December I rated it just as you have here. One of my three top wines in 2022, in what is one of the greatest Bordeaux vintages I have ever tasted. A little less “classic” (a loaded term open to interpretation, I know!) than 2016 and 2019, nevertheless a great vintage which I predict will be regarded as one of the greats in future years. It may be an atypical vintage overall, but then so was 1982 in its youth…“
I don’t have a good enough price on this locally yet to try it ($280, no case discount), but did try DDC last week, and whereas “polished tannins, freshness and drinking pleasure” is exactly how I would have described that wine in 2016 on release, in 2022 it was pretty awkward and rough around the edges. It’s interesting how differently these can show at different times in different places.
Fascinating to read some of those old notes on wines from the late 19th and early 20th centuries. No doubt the changes since then have been enormous.
Earlier accessibility sure seems to be a thing compared to the middle of the 20th century. If you like them young, drink them young. I enjoy them young as long as they’re not shut down. But that aged complexity is a big part of what I love about Bordeaux. It’s worth waiting for.
I think that earlier accessibility and aged complexity can co-exist. Vintages familiar to those of us still enjoying Bordeaux can offer some hope. Many said the 1982s wouldn’t age well: too accessible early, too ripe, too fruit forward, not enough acid. They aged just fine. Same with the 2000s. Not exactly the same as some of my favorites from the ‘80s, but plenty of additional complexity is developing to make it worth cellaring these wines 20-30 years. I’m less sanguine about some of the vintages that pushed ripeness and extraction to the max, but the pendulum has shifted away from those extremes. I have high hopes for 2016 and 2019.
I opened a 375 of '16 Pichon Comtesse this past week and it was drinking great as a PnP. I did not buy any '22 Pichon, but I did buy '22 Montrose and now I am looking forward to opening a bottle once it is delivered.