Juicy, with nice grip underlying the mix of red and black currant fruit, laced with tobacco, hot stone and garrigue notes. Very lively.

Wine Spectator Rating: 90

[Issue: Nov 30/09]

Very bright and racy, with mouthwatering damson plum, crushed cherry, lavender, iron and tobacco notes that race through the well-focused finish. Long and pure, with a lingering spice note.

Wine Spectator Rating: 91

[Issue: July 31/09]

The 2008 Gigondas exhibits a dark ruby/purple-tinged color along with sweet aromas of black fruits, licorice, tobacco leaf, and crushed rocks. Medium-bodied with admirable concentration and depth, it is an elegant, richly fruity Gigondas that should drink nicely for 5-6 years. .

Wine Advocate Rating: (89-91)

[Issue: #185 / Oct 09]

Big and juicy, with a nice dusting of cocoa powder framing blackberry, melted fig and tobacco notes. The long finish lets a nice minerality linger. Rock-solid.

Wine Spectator Rating: 91

[Issue: July 31/09]

Dark ruby purple in color, with aromas of currant and dried flowers. Full-bodied, with fine tannins and a delicious finish. Tight now, but pretty and balanced. Best after 2012. 10,000 cases made. #40 in Wine Spectator TOP 100

Wine Spectator Rating: 92

[Issue: March 31/09]

This is gorgeously pure, with an extremely silky texture carrying violet, cassis and iron notes that blaze through the sanguine-tinged finish. Offers length and precision in a seamless package. Drink now through 2020. 750 cases made.

wine Spectator Rating: 93

[Issue: May 31/09]

A real sleeper of the vintage and a sensational effort from the Casteja family, Batailley has turned out a complete, powerful, classic Pauillac, with oodles of black currant fruit as well as hints of new saddle leather, toast, chocolate, and forest floor. Full-bodied, dense, and built for the long haul, this wine should be reasonably drinkable in 4-5 years and last for two decades. Good value.

Wine Advocate Rating: 91

[Issue: #181 / Feb 09]

Dark ruby. Potent aromas of berry and cherry skin, minerals and black olive, plus a hint of cracked pepper. Racy, finely etched raspberry and bitter cherry gain flesh with air and take on a sweet violet pastille quality. This juicy, refreshing and nicely balanced wine finishes with very good lift and persistent minerality.

Int'l Wine Cellar Rating: 92

[Issue: Jan/Feb 10]

This tiny garagiste St.-Emilion, 7.5 acres, is a blend of 51% Cabernet Franc, 46% Merlot, and 3% Cabernet Sauvignon. Proprietor Jean-Philippe Janoueix has fashioned a full-bodied, deep, concentrated wine revealing sweet notes of licorice, chocolate, espresso, cassis, and cherry. Long, dense, full-bodied, rich, and pure with enough oak and acidity to add complexity and focus, it should drink well for 12-15 years. Interestingly, this cuvee received a Burgundian-like treatment of malolactic in barrel after frequent pigeages in small oak fermentation tanks, an unusual upbringing in Bordeaux. The wine is bottled unfined and unfiltered.

Wine Advocate Rating: 91

[Issue: #181 / Feb 09]

Plush and forward, with a nice beam of red licorice, plum sauce and mocha. The long, juicy finish is framed by buried minerality.

Wine Spectator Rating: 92

[Issue: Oct 31/08]

I believe the 2007 Chateauneuf du Pape is the finest wine ever made at Charvin. Their wines never achieve a lot of color, but this is one of the most saturated ones they have produced. The blend from the 45- to 50-year-old vines is 85% Grenache and the rest equal parts Syrah, Mourvedre, and Vaccarese, all aged in cement tanks prior to being bottled unfiltered. A terrific nose of kirsch, lavender, licorice, forest floor, and spice box soars from the glass of this full-bodied effort. With fabulous density, a multidimensional mouthfeel, and a 45+-second finish this brilliant, elegant, feminine-styled wine is loaded with concentration and intensity. Like many 2007 Chateauneuf du Papes, the extraordinary fruit level makes it hard to resist. However, it will be even better in 3-5 years, and should last for 15-20.

Wine Advocate Rating: 97

[Issue: #185 / Oct 09]

Here the notably spicier and marginally more elegant red berry fruit and earth notes serve to gracefully introduce the sweet and discreetly spicy moderately full flavors that are firm and focused and admirably persistent while exhibiting ample Nuits character but like the Vignerondes, there is virtually no rusticity on the firm, long and palate staining finish.

Burghound Rating: 91

[Issue: #33 / Jan 09]

Saturated red-ruby color. Pure, vibrant nose features smoky black cherry. Rich, sweet and pure, with superb energy to the flavors of black and red cherry and minerals. Impressively dense, broad wine, finishing with excellent lingering perfume and solid spine for aging.

Int'l Wine Cellar Rating: 92

[Issue: May/June 09]

In contrast to the expressiveness of the prior wines, here the nose is reserved, indeed brooding with pretty but cool red berry fruit notes that marry into supple, round and admirably pure medium-bodied flavors that are moderately concentrated, all wrapped in a long balanced and harmonious finish that again displays very fine tannins. This has enough Pommard muscle to age very well.

Burghound Rating: 91

[Issue: #30 / Apr 08]

This too possesses a wonderfully layered nose but here the aromatic profile runs more to the floral and earthy side with dark pinot fruit sliding into rich, full and distinctly more powerful flavors that are tautly muscular in character while culminating in a long and sappy finish. This doesn't have any where near the same degree of finesse but it's bigger, longer and possesses even more depth.

Burghound Rating: 91

[Issue: #30 / Apr 08]

A much more deeply pitched nose featuring a highly complex mélange of red, blue and black berry aromas that also evidence notes of violets, anise, clove and cinnamon that slide gracefully into round, rich, intense and velvety flavors brimming with dry extract that largely if not completely buffer the tannins on the moderately chewy and hugely long finish. It's rare for an Ech to potentially top the collection of grands crus such as Magnien has in his line up but that's what the early potential here suggests.

Burghound Rating: (91-94)

[Issue: #29 / Jan 08]

Like the Bèze, this also displays a bit of wood spice that frames intensely earthy and layered red and blue berry fruit aromas nuanced by hints of minerals and violets that complement well the supple, round and broad-shouldered flavors that offer excellent volume on the serious and hugely long flavors that possess excellent depth. A very fine effort that stops just short of being profound.

Burghound Rating: (90-93)

[Issue: #28 / Jan 08]

I clearly underestimated the ability of the '01 Chambertin to eat the very generous wood as well as it has. The explosive, spicy, earthy, intense red and black fruit nose complements perfectly the deep, broad, muscular and beautifully intense flavors that culminate in a rich and mouth coating finish of superb length. This is a classically styled, masculine and mineral-driven Chambertin with plenty of finishing power plus outstanding length. While this could be drunk now with pleasure, it's indisputably still on its way up and I would be inclined to give in another 6 to 10 years in the cellar first. In a word, impressive.

Burghound Rating: 93

[Issue: Web / Dec 09]

Really packed, but amazingly supple and velvety in texture, with layer upon layer of black mission fig, crushed plum, freshly brewed espresso, worn saddle leather and iron notes all driving through the long, long finish. The structure is well-integrated already, but this has a long life ahead of it. Best from 2009 through 2030. 1,800 cases made.

Wine Spectator Rating: 98

[Issue: July 31/08]

An elegant, ripe and expressive wine that is very densely fruited with obvious floral notes that include rose petal and violets introduces rich, full, powerful and concentrated flavors that possess more minerality than is typically the case for a classic Clos de Vougeot, all wrapped in a textured, precise, fresh and energetic finish. This has plenty of underlying tension and as good as the Grands Echézeaux is, and it is indeed excellent, the Clos de Vougeot is simply at another level. A spectacular wine for the vintage but made for the long-term.

Burghound Rating: 95

[Issue: #37 / Jan 10]

This too is quite restrained with almost exclusively red berry fruit and intense floral aromas that are high-toned and pure while complementing the supple, textured, dusty and extremely precise flavors that exude a quiet power on the brooding and linear finish that delivers outstanding length. This will require every bit of a decade to resolve the very firm structure. This is less elegant than the 1er but more powerful and the distinguishing character of the '06 Bonnes Mares is the serenity that it projects. I thought that it would be good but this knocks on the door of being genuinely great.

Burghound Rating: 94

[Issue: #33 / Jan 09]

This is also extremely floral with a nose that moderately resembles that of the Amoureuses as the airy, spicy and ripe mélange of red and blue pinot fruit displays really lovely violet and rose petal notes that are picked up by the minerally, intense and harmonious flavors that are beautifully proportioned and are blessed with ample amounts of dry extract on the essence of pinot and explosive, hugely long finish. This is almost exotic in character yet everything is in beautiful concordance. In a word, great.

Burghound Rating: (93-96)

[Issue: #29 / Jan 08]

The 2006 Haut-Brion performed even better from bottle than it did from barrel. Sixty-four percent of the production went into this wine, and while it displays the vintage’s powerful tannins and structure, it possesses superb concentration, and the minerality/scorched earth notes of a great Haut-Brion. Medium to full-bodied, with perhaps not quite the fleshiness of the 2005 or 2000, it is built more along the lines of the 1998 and 1996. It is a brilliant effort displaying sensational purity, texture, and length that should be exceptionally long-lived. Anticipated maturity: 2017-2035.

Wine Advocate Rating: 96

[Issue: #181 / Feb 09]

One of the fabulous surprises, although I had suggested last year that it could jump in quality, of my tastings, the 2006 Lafite Rothschild is a great, great wine made from a blend of 82% Cabernet Sauvignon, 16% Merlot, and 2% Petit Verdot. When I tasted it from barrel, it reminded me of their successful 1988, but it is dramatically superior to that vintage. Frankly, it may turn out to be as good as the 2005, which in all of Bordeaux is a far greater vintage than 2006. Lafite’s severe selection process (42% made it into the grand vin) resulted in a full-bodied wine boasting an extraordinary perfume of charcoal, truffles, lead pencil shavings, and sensationally sweet, ripe black currant and cedar notes. A wine of extraordinary intensity, texture, and depth with silky tannins as well as awesome concentration, this has turned out to be a remarkable Lafite Rothschild that should be drinkable much earlier than the 2005, but age for three decades. Anticipated maturity: 2014-2035+.

Wine Advocate Rating: 97

[Issue: #181 / Feb 09]

A sensational effort, the 2006 Mouton Rothschild exhibits an opaque purple color as well as a classic Mouton perfume of creme de cassis, flowers, blueberries, and only a hint of oak. Dalhuin told me that in whisky barrel-tasting vintages such as 1989 and 1990, Mouton was aged in heavily-toasted barrels, and they have backed off to a much lighter toast for the barrels’ interior. I think this has worked fabulously well with the cassis quality fruit they get from their Cabernet Sauvignon. The full-bodied, powerful 2006 possesses extraordinary purity and clarity. A large-scaled, massive Mouton Rothschild that ranks as one of the top four or five wines of the vintage, it may turn out to be the longest-lived wine of the vintage by a landslide. The label will undoubtedly be controversial as a relative of Sigmund Freud, Lucian Freud, has painted a rather comical Zebra staring aimlessly at what appears to be a palm tree in the middle of a stark courtyard. I suppose a psychiatrist could figure out the relationship between that artwork and wine, but I couldn’t see one. This utterly profound Mouton will need to sleep for 15+ years before it will reveal any secondary nuances, but it is a packed and stacked first-growth Pauillac of enormous potential. Anticipated maturity: 2020-2060+.

Wine Advocate Rating: 98+

[Issue: #181 / Feb 09]