by Wine Owners
Posted on 2013-06-11
The Wine Owners team had a BYO dinner at Cafe Anglais last month where we tasted some great wines. Here's the order of fare:
Les Plantiers de Haut-Brion Blanc Pessac Leognan 2007
Les Plantiers is a very limited production white from the young vines of Haut Brion and La Mission Haut Brion. It offers more than a hint of the style and quality of the Grand Vin, with a zesty and lively fruit appeal supported by good depth and minerality. Pure and balanced, long in the mouth, it will drink well on arrival but could also take five year's cellaring.
(90 points RP)
WO team view: White wine of the night. Taut, really long and pure, with at least a decade of life ahead.
Domaine Remi Jobard Meursault Charmes Premier Cru 2001
The superb, white flower-scented 2001 Meursault-Charmes splendidly combines breadth, depth, density, and concentration with focus, balance, and elegance. This intensely flavored wine is crammed with creamed minerals, limestone, chalk, and juicy spiced pears whose flavors can be experienced throughout its magisterial finish. (93-95 points WA)
WO team view: Showing why 2001 is such an extraordinary white burgundy vintage. The WA note reflects current reality perfectly.
Domaine Georges Roumier Morey-Saint-Denis Clos de la Bussiere Premier Cru 1997
Bright and scintillating if a little more backward than Roumier Chambolles. Gripping dark cherry and cherry stone fruit with touches of bramble and cassis wrapped in firm, defining fruit tannins. There is also a savoury mineral, stone and herb dimension, making this a very complex, complete Morey.
WO team view: Top of its game, and would have been a candidate for wine of the night were it not for..
Domaine Ghislaine Barthod Chambolle-Musigny Les Charmes Premier Cru 1999
The stunning 1999 Chambolle-Musigny Les Charmes is medium to dark ruby-colored and has an explosive blackberry, raspberry, and super-ripe cherry-scented nose. Medium to full-bodied, broad, and satin-textured, this is a superb wine that coats the palate with loads of cherries, violets, and candied black raspberries. Its perfumed, harmonious personality is feminine, expansive, and concentrated. Additionally, it reveals an exceptionally long, juicy, and delineated finish. It is the finest wine I have ever tasted from Mme. Barthod. Projected maturity: 2005-2014. (93-95 points WA)
WO team view: Not quite as boisterous as the deep, intense Morey. More to come in the coming few years.
Domaine du Pegau Cuvee Reservee Chateauneuf du Pape 1995
The 1995 Cuvee Reservee exhibits an opaque black/purple color, and extraordinary rich, intense aromas of smoke, black raspberries, kirsch, and spice. Exceptionally full-bodied, with an unctuous texture, and a thick, rich, expansive mid-palate, this superbly concentrated wine appears to be a worthy rival to this estate's phenomenal 1989 and 1990. This is a blockbuster Chateauneuf du Pape. Anticipated maturity: 2001-2020. (94 points Robert Parker)
WO team view: Perfectly mature, gamey and uniquely complex. Rich, sappy, utterly beguiling and moorish.
Chateau Grand Puy Lacoste Pauillac 5eme Cru Classe 1989
I absolutely love the nose on this wine, with amazing aromas of currant, tar, spices and berries that jump out of the glass. Loads of flowers, too. So complex. Delivers a full-bodied palate, with racy tannins and lots of flavor, from tar to spices to leather. A little tight, and so enjoyable now, but better in a few years still.’ (2010) (95 points, James Suckling)
WO team view: Wine of the night. Extraordinarily complex; it kept evolving in the decanter throughout dinner. GPL simply stomped all over Hosanna. No context, embarrassing really...
Chateau Hosanna Pomerol 2000
Dense ruby/purple, with a glorious nose of blackberries, cassis, white flowers, licorice, and a hint of sweet oak, this seamless wine is a classic example of purity and symmetry. A singular style reminiscent of a hypothetical blend of Cheval Blanc and L'Evangile.
(96 points, Robert Parker)
WO team view: Yeah it's good. Rich, deep, quite lingering, but made to look very ordinary by GPL 1989.
Domaine Huet Cuvee Constance Moelleux Vouvray 1993
The 1993 Cuvée Constance has a remarkably rich colour for any wine from Vouvray, belying the intensity of this nectar. The nose is remarkable, marked by aromas of rich golden syrup, with a whispering seam of botrytis which has a curiously dry suggestion, as does the nutty, caramel nuances that follow on. This is deep, complex and multi-faceted. Chris Kissack
WO team view: Lovely end to an amazing dinner, and not a single duff bottle. A sign of good fortune with which to toast the success of Wine Owners perhaps?
By the way, did you want to know the food that accompanied the wines? Thought not...
by Wine Owners
Posted on 2013-04-05
With updated prices released on Wine Owners' - the world's first full service, independent asset management and trading exchange - it's an opportune time to check on the market price of Chateau Latour 1995.
Why? Because having withdrawn from the en primeur release system in April 2012, Latour director Frederic Engerer had announced that each year a vintage of Chateau Latour and the second wine, Les Forts de Latour, would be released at the start of their perfect drinking window.On March 19th 2013 the first of the 'library' releases, 1995, was offered at a UK retail price of (GBP) £4,950.Each bottle comes with a prooftag (a security product guaranteeing traceability and authenticity) and sports a back label stating the date of shipment from the chateau.1995 was a great vintage for Latour, as evidenced by the following wine critic reviews:
Robert Parker 96 points (June 2000)
A beauty, the opaque dense purple-coloured 1995 exhibits jammy cassis, vanillin, and minerals in its fragrant but still youthful aromatics. Medium to full-bodied, with exceptional purity, superb concentration, and a long, intense, ripe, 40-second finish, this is a magnificent example of Latour. As the wine sat in the glass, scents of roasted espresso and toasty new oak emerged. This classic will require considerable cellaring. Anticipated maturity: to 2050.
Jancis Robinson 18.5 points (2011)
Lustrous deep crimson almost right out to the rim still. Hint of mint on the nose – quite aromatic. Pretty. Charming for a Latour grand vin! Though there is a strong undertow of graphite. More intense than 1996. Drink to 2035
Lisa Perrotti-Brown 96 points (Nov 2012)
Deep garnet-brick in colour, the nose is well developed, displaying dried berry, leather, vanilla pod and anise notes with a faint whiff of potpourri. The palate is wonderfully fleshy and opulent with velvety, approachable tannins and a long finish.
Latour took criticism for their release price from some quarters arguing that that it was too high compared to market prices for previously released-en-primeur bottles of 1995.
Our analysis (Wine Owners Market Level calculation: base data sourced from Wine Searcher) shows the current market price per bottle is £351, or the rounded equivalent of £4,200 for a 12x75cl case.
As the chart shows this is down from £433 per bottle in April 2012, or the rounded equivalent of £5,200 for a 12x75cl case, showing the prolonged tough time first growths have endured since hitting their giddy heights in the summer of 2011.
So is a £700 case market premium for an ex chateau release with perfect provenance and a prooftag worth it?
Yes, according to Lisa Perrotti-Brown MW who believes a 15% premium is worth paying to source that perfectly stored and shipped wine.
And that, funnily enough, is precisely the premium that Latour decided to place on the 1995 library release.
by Wine Owners
Posted on 2013-03-25
Wine Owners provides drinking advice across a large part of its growing database of 82,000 fine wines, based on 75cl bottles.
These drinking ranges are likely to be rather accurate, since we painstakingly average start and end dates from fine wine reviewers to arrive at the estimates.
It goes without saying that prime drinking will depend on many factors, such as long-term storage conditions, time of year shipped and periods when palettes may have been subjected to intense heat, for example dockside between reefer and cooled ship's container.
Those drinking dates can be largely disregarded when it comes to large formats. This Easter reminded me how dramatic the differences can be, when I judged a family dinner at my brother's new house to be the perfect occasion to open a double magnum of Mas de Daumas Gassac 1996.
Bought just a year ago on the secondary market, this 3 litre double magnum was apparently well kept, coming out of good storage in its original wooden box and with a high fill level. I acquired it on a whim for GBP 80, knowing full well that the standard bottle size of this vintage could well be fading fast, following Cellartracker! notes and Chris Kissack from The Wine Doctor.
In the event, once the wax seal was broken and a delicate cork extracted, the wine was delightful; darkly coloured with a rusty-bricked rim. Sweet cedar and savoury scents gave way to a palate of earthy blackberry, lifted with bright notes of fresh currents providing the requisite balance and energy on the way to a soft delicate finish. Hard to resist before the meal, but showing enough power and substance to complement the roast duck.
The moral of this story: take drinking advice for large formats with a large pinch of salt.
Buying bigger bottles on the secondary from other collectors can be a rewarding experience full of nice surprises. Sure there are disappointments along the path of discovery and fine wine appreciation, and you can't exactly ask for your money back from another collector. But that misses the point; buy what you can afford and savour the victories!
