A great evening with friends, starting with some champagne, a couple of white burgundies where a Raveneu Valmur 2012 excelled, and some goose liver with d’Yquem 88, and ending up with cheese and a couple Rieslings reported on in that thread. The main subject, however, were 1980s Bordeaux. We did an extensive 1985 a couple of years ago, and peoples cellars are currently severely lacking In 82s. So thefollowing are those we did, I’ve tried to collect some impressions from an evening with superb food and lot of friendly chatter and discussions (we were 12).
All wines decanted 2-3 hrs before serving in vintage flights with some light, inbetween, food, except for the 86 which were served as 4th flight with a main course. All flights served half blind (we knew the wines but not the order of serving). Notes taken before the bottles were revealed.
Mouton-Rotschild 1983 Great wine. Floral and very elegant, slightly vegetal but extremely well balanced and perfectly mature. 95 p
Ch Lafitte 1983 Red berries, lacks some concentration and fruit. Acids shines through. A suboptimal bottle 87p
Ch Latour 1983. Slightly floral and pretty elegant. Nice fruit, develops somewhat in the glass but slightly lean with some tannins. Didn’t get a good read on this but probably 91-92 p
Ch Margaux 1983 Beautiful fruit, extremely seductive. Very concentrated, sweet-and-sour fruit, and very long. 96 p
Ch Lafitte 1986 Quite acidic, still somewhat tight fruit. Pretty complex, some graphite but still about potential, 94 p
Ch Margaux 1986 Sweet fruit, slighty dark. Great mouthfeel and length, perhaps the best of the 86s which were all still slightly too (?) young. 95 p
Ch Leoville-Las-Cases 1986 Very accessible, red fruits and florality. Also some graphite and beautiful balance but still upside. 94 p
Mouton-Rotschild 1988 Slightly soft, dark fruit, leather. Well integrated tannins and pretty fruit. Some graphite, the most complete wine of these 88s. 94 p
Ch Lafitte 1988 Some graphite, cellar dark berries and som vegetality. Light on its feet, disappoiting, 91 p NB. Was brought up again 5 hrs later. Still graphite and dark fruits, but the fruit was much tighter, fuller and far better balanced. Young, 93 p
Ch Latour 1988 Slightly firm tannins but mature fruit and good balance. Slightly lean but opens and develops well, I like this style. Good with food (reindeer). 93 p
Mouton-Rotschild 1989 Takes some time to open, slightly darker fruit. Soft and accessible fruit with tight core, still some youth to the tannins. 93 p
Ch Leoville-Las-Cases 1989 Rich and elegant fruit. Superb balance and very perfumed fruit. Sweet and sour, long with still some upside. 95 p
Ch Palmer 1989 Fine acidic freshness, flowers, light tannins, elegant but dries up slightly. Very good but I’ve had slightly better bottles. 94 p
Some observations: We all hought it would be somewhat easier to pick individual styles. With age good wine tend to develop towards some common “vanishing point”, and bottle variation throws some further complexities into the equation. No great wines, only great bottles etc, particularly for older bottles.
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