Cult Wine Tasting

Cult Wine Tasting
18 June 2009

Cloudy Bay Sauvignon Blanc 2008
16/20 Drink now £20
Clear, bordering on colourless. The nose has an almost jumping out of the glass character. Becoming a bit of a caricature of itself? Has that strong pyrazine note, very piquant and distinctive. The palate is thinner than one would expect with such aromatic intensity, almost a bit of a let down. Classic cat’s pee sort of notes. Melon? Plenty of acidity to keep it crisp. Short / medium length.

For those who like this sort of thing, all well and good, but I think there are better examples (at better prices) to be found now than Cloudy Bay. For me, this is just all to much. It seems to be carving out a sort of unnatural super-charged Sauvignon Blanc character that just isn’t too my taste.

Didier Dagueneau Silex 2005
17-/20 Will keep ??10 years £65
A classic from the late icon of the Loire Valley – indeed icon of winemakers around the world. A superlative vintage too. Complex nose, dominated by light fruits. Heavy, masculine pallet. Dry but with great reserves of fruit that almost give it a sweeter character. Musky, in a good way. Oily but totally balanced with it. This takes Sauvignon Blanc to a whole new level of complexity and refinement. Almost reminds me of some of the great Sauvignon Blancs from Bordeaux – to my mind it has more in common with these than some of its siblings from other Loire producers. Defined by its length and subtleties. A great wine.

Vega Sicilia Unico 1974
18-19/20 Will doubtless keep decades, but drinking beautifully now £238
What can I say? My notes on this wine are marked by their brevity. One word – wonderful. A great wine in a great vintage. Captivating open nose of immense depth and complexity – every time you return to it another character emerges. Overall it is dominated by notes of maturity including tobacco, coffee and even tea. The plaate is full and balanced. Soft tannins are still present, with sufficient acidity to keep the wine fresh for many years to come. Persistent finish with great length. A truly great wine, the memory of which will stay with all those tasting it for many years to come.

Domaine de la Romanée-Conti La Tâche 1998
18/20. Decades ahead of it. £864
Pale colour typical of Pinot Noir and no darker than any other good Burgundy. Very aromatic, perfumed nose. Perfume is the right word to describe this – all the classic words like velvety, enveloping, alluring come to mind when nosing this. It has a sweet, soft, comforting character unique to such great wines. The palate does not let itself down either with great depth of fruit built on a solid backbone. The tannins are not overbearing in any way, but this reminds me of a stocky Nuit-St-George in the quality of them. Clearly a wine for the long haul. The continued evolution in the glass proved we did this wine an injustice by moving on too early.

I have one main concern about this wine - the price to quality ratio. Let there be no doubt this is a truly outstanding example of what Burgundy can achieve. But note I say Burgundy – not Romanée-Conti specifically – as there are other domains producing great wines too. Hence my concern that you are clearly paying sorely through the nose just to have a Romanée-Conti in your cellar. Is this the result of the blue-chip commodity status these wines have achieved? Doubtless, yes, and for those with the money to invest in these wines good luck to them. My worry is that the more passionate wine enthusiast and collector will purchase this to be the finest wine in the world – and I don’t think it is. Don’t get me wrong, my complaint isn’t not the monetary value exactly, more what you are getting in return. You are paying for a bottle with Romanée-Conti on the label. Some may think they are paying for what is inside, but I’m not sure the two are directly connected any more.

Though I should note my intrinsic bias here in that while I try to be objective in tasting this and can clearly see its greatness, I am firstly offended by the price and secondly would rather be drinking something a little more edgy for the same money – a great vintage of Grange or La Chapelle for example. Just my thoughts anyway…

Château Musar 1997
16/20 Will keep for up to another 10 years, but drinking well now £21
This was clearly the surprise of the tasting. Not a noted vintage of Musar, and coming from that period in the 1990s that some critics suggested the wines were missing their old concentration. Regardless, this famous Lebanese wine stood up to its esteemed company remarkably well and shrugged off any worries with a great display of what makes Musar so unique and revered. Still maintaining a deep coloured core, the wine was showing little age. Wonderful open nose marked by that love-it-or-hate-it volatile acidity not too far removed from nail varnish remover. This continued through onto the palate, balanced by a core of spicy fruit. Tannin more rough than polished is in the nature of this wine and just adds to the character. My only concern was that the finish was rather short.

I think this was doubtless showing at its best this evening, but given the concerns about the winemaking and vintage I wouldn’t bet on keeping this much longer if I had any in my cellar. Though from tasting excellent lesser vintages back to the 1970s, I would never be in a hurry to write off any vintage of Musar.

Regardless, its showing tonight and its ability to hold its own against wines over ten-times more expensive won Musar a lot of new fans.

Gaja Barbaresco Costa Russi 1985
16.5/20 Drink up £243
I’m not sure what to make of this wine. Clearly in such a heterogeneous tasting it is quite difficult to place it, but coming after the Musar did seem like the right place for it. Despite this, I was just expecting a little more from it than I found. Open nose, redolent of the classic Nebbiolo characters of tar, rubber, rose water perfumes. The palate however was lacking a little fruit to my mind. Plenty of rasping Nebbiolo tannin still abound and really dried the palate out without much fruit to balance it. Still sufficient acidity to keep it fresh. Overall I was slightly underwhelmed by this wine. Is this bottle not showing so well or is it just a little too old? I would like to re-judge it set with some local Barbaresco produce over dinner to do it justice – though wouldn’t everyone?!

Stags’ Leap Cask 23 1995
15.5-16/20 Short term keeping, drink up £172
This wine really didn’t do it for me, although others seemed to be impressed. I found it a very good example of Cabernet Sauvignon, but certainly not a great one. It has matured very quickly, but without any great complexity. All in all I found this rather one dimensional. A good Bordeaux at the same price would run rings around this, and I say that as someone who is not a particularly great fan of Bordeaux wines!

Château Latour 1967
16.5-17/20 Will keep++ £258
A pleasure to be able to taste such a great mature vintage of Latour – but only for half the people attending as one of the two bottle was definitely faulty. Not corked, but clearly not showing as well in comparison to the other, which was on fine form. Buyer beware with these older vintages even of the greatest wines. If we had only had the lesser bottle we would have been left with a very different impression.

Thankfully the impression that we were left with was one that admirably lived up to the great reputation of this first growth. For me, the most notable feature throughout the tasting was how well this had aged – or not in fact, as to taste this blind I’m sure most would underestimate the age by at least 10 years. This seem to be a hallmark of the good years of Latour, and something I have come across before in other first growths. Indeed, I have been caught out myself guessing the age when tasting a vintage from the 1970s. I was wrong by about 15 years!

Pale red rim, but still a deeper core persists. Classic notes of cedar, tea, fine old tobacco. Some very fine tannin remains on the palate but thinning out now. Indeed, this wine is thinning out overall, surely slowly coming towards the end of its long plateau? The word I would use is delicate.

Château Cheval Blanc 1997
15.5/20 Drink now £149
Good now. Not a keeper. Showing more maturity than expected, but without really feeling it is peaking, more just growing old. I would be upset if I had bought any of this at the over-inflated 1997 en primeur prices.

Château d’Yquem 1999
16/20 Will keep, might not improve £158
Together with the Cheval, the last two wines of the night proved a little bit of a let down for the finish. While d’Yquem can always make something good of even lesser vintages, the 1999 was not a patch on other vintages I have tasted (even lesser ones). At first I was worried we would be committing infanticide opening such a young bottle, but this has now reached its tenth birthday and is ready for broaching. Golden, luscious, and complex with ample acidity to ensure a long life. My big concern however was the lack of the classic piquant botrytis character that d’Yquem always exhibits in such a unique and distinctive way. This was very subdued, but with no indication that there was anything wrong with the bottles. It just seemed to be missing from the 1999, which relegated it from being the king of sweet wines to the slightly less exalted level of a great Sauternes. Previous bottles have always stood head and shoulders above the other wines of the appellation, but not the case here. I don’t want to leave you with the impression this was not an impressive wine, it was, just a lot less than I would normally expect d’Yquem to be.


Final verdict

It was a fascinating exercise in wine tasting to sample such a great and contrasting array of wines in one evening. An undoubted treat, but the final conclusion of many was that incremental appreciation in quality for the most expensive wines was very small – too small to justify the premium you would pay for these. In a scientific way, the quality versus price would appear to follow a sigmoid curve – beyond a certain point the increase in quality returned is minimal despite large increases in price.

Considering the red wines, on a show of hands the favourites from the evening were:

• Vega Sicilia Unico 1974: 15 votes
• Domaine de la Romanée-Conti La Tâche 1998: 6 votes
• Château Musar 1997: 1 vote
• Gaja Barbaresco Costa Russi 1985: 3 votes
• Stags’ Leap Cask 23 1995: 3 votes
• Château Latour 1967: 1 vote
• Château Cheval Blanc 1997: 1 vote

• Best value wine: Château Musar 1997

So it seems the clear majority favoured the Vega Scilia, followed by the La Tâche.