95+ tasting 2001
This year I early received a request from one taster to include a bunch of white wines in one flight, and white Burgundy in particular. I agreed, so I forwarded the request in my invitation. It isn't easy to find white 95+ wines but we succeeded to get in 8 white, included some provided from my own cellar.
So this year the red flight "only" contained 10 wines and one desert wine.
My idea with the 95+ tasting is to compare as many wine styles as possible. This is best arranged by :
The white flight
96 points - 1994 Sbragia Chardonnay limited release, Beringer
Nearly golden colour. Much oak and smoke, rich fruit and firm, powerful bottom. An elegant and smashing nose. The taste on the same way, full and rich, with a firm and well-built acidity, not too high but enough for keeping the wine fresh. This wine opened the tasting like a hurricane and pleased most of us including me, putting around 97 points. Some tasters were too blown away, and stopped around 95 points.
97 points - 1994 Sancerre Chavignol, Pierre Boulay
Powerful yellow colour. The nose was (for me) worn dish-cloth, typically implying Loire, but rather Chenin Blanc than Sauvignon Blanc. Also tar firewood, rhubarb and cat urine implying primarily Sauvignon. The taste was built on a robust acidity, nearly clumsy in its appearance. From the smell, the taste of high acidity was a surprise. The tasters spent a considerable time on guessing on everything around the world. After its origin was disclosed, nobody have heard about this producer. Most tasters put only 91 - 93 points on this wine, mainly depending on the high acidity. I was more positive because I found on the whole the fruit to be enough rich to cover the acidity.
97 points - 1995 Ermitage de l'Orée, Chapoutier
Substantial yellow colour. Soft, flowery smell, violet and licorice, coconut and pineapple, but no the expected worn dish-cloth here. Very flexible and fiery taste. The aftertaste was impressive long, hinting us of good quality. A good, low-keyed wine with a lot of potential, this wine was judged between 92 - 97 depending on the tasters preferences of this wine style.
94 - 96 points - 1996 Mersault Perrières, Comtes Lafon
A powerful yellow colour. Open, delicious smell, expensive and solid, with a firm acidity in the bottom combined with showy and fluffy tones on the top. One taster held a long inflammatory speech to the honour of Burgundy and its great terroir and was supported by the rest of the group. Many tasters had very bad memory of 1989 and 1990 Comtes Lafon, but this was a complete contrast. Nobody was lower than 96 points and most marked the wine between 97 and 98 points.
95 points - 1996 Chassagne-Montrachet, Clos de la Maltroie, Michel Niellon
Rather pale yellow colour. Shy smell of flowers, citrus and raspberry jellies, but also some bitterness like from rhubarb and herbs. When carefully chilled, the wine did contain a lot of acidity crystals, hinting us about its acid level and misled somebody to guess Riesling. The taste was restrained and did neither help us too much. The contributor explained that the wine was supposed to rest another decade in the cellar and many of us did believe this. We judged it from 90 to 96, reflecting the unsecured potential.
95 points - 1995 Ch de Beaucastel Vieilles Vignes Blanc
Slightly copper tone in its golden yellow colour. Tired and almost oxidised in the nose, this wine was immediately questioned. A second bottle was chilled, and showed to be a little more fresh, but still questioned. Herbs and grass, big and beautiful, a perplexing smell. The taste was low in acidity, buttery, spicy and woolly. All tasters were rather agreed on 92 points and an unsecured future.
97 points - 1995 Pinot Gris Rangen Clos St Urbain, Zind-Humbrecht
Golden yellow colour. Sweet, strong, mature smell of Pinot Gris and Zind-Humbrecht. The taste was dryer than expected from the nose. Actually this wine was judged to be half dry by most of the tasters. (The wine contained 7 gram residual sugar per litre, which is often declared to be plain dry). The smell was so focused and the acidity so pure and marked, that a few tasters got Riesling in their heads. All tasters sang the praises of the wine and gave it 97 - 99, despite I reminded them about the residual sugar and the élitist producer.
The white bonus wine
93 - 96+ points - 1996 Chablis Valmur, Verget
As seen from the point range, the average doesn't reach 95 points. But a supplementary rule for the 95+ tasting says that extra bonus bottles, beyond the one from each taster, may have scored lower than 95 or may not even have a Parker score. So this was the first bonus wine. Rather deep yellow colour. Rich, yeasty smell, like a Champagne. The acidity has a powerful attack in the nose and mouth. The taste is like still Champagne with yeast and fresh apples. Approximately half of the group found this wine to be an excellent example of Chablis and put around 95 points. The other half were more doubtful, somebody going as low as 91 points.
The red flight98+ - 1998 Ermitage le Pavillon, Chapoutier
Rather dark, brick red. Young and aromatic and surprisingly open and forward smell. Also some herb and red berries. A good balance in the taste and very easy to drink. But far too light and depersonalised for an Hermitage. Everybody did admit that this was a fine wine at 92 - 95 points, but for the year, vineyard and producer it was a disappointment. Sometimes Parker rightfully assign high points to Chapoutier (as the white l'Orée above), but quite often Parker seems to give high points to Chapoutier in a routine fashion.
97 - 1987 Dominus estate
Dark, brick red. Mature fruit, rather Bordeaux like with cedar and stable, more power than elegance. The wine has matured into a very stylish geriatric with great harmony built on a fresh acidity. Once again the already mentioned taster held a long inflammatory speech about the unique terroir of Bordeaux but this time he was brutally corrected by me :=). In fact every each taster believed this to be Bordeaux, so the Dominus francofile style was obviously evident. We rated the wine as Parker did, but if that point arose from the Bordeaux biased mislead or not we will never know.
99+ - 1993 Clos de la Roche Vieilles Vignes, Ponsot
Rather dark, brick red. Fat and rich smell from strawberry jam accompanied by some oak. Rich also in the mouth, a lovely Pinot having the desired typicalness, rotten strawberry included. I was quite positive and so were a few more tasters, giving the wine around 96 points. But the majority was less impressed and some tasters even claimed it did slackened in the glass not deserving over 90 points.
95 - 1991 Silver Oak, Cabernet Sauvignon, Napa
Dark, ruby to brick red colour. Cold and somewhat hard in the smell, firm and well packed, sun-drenched raisins, dill and bred spices. Also somewhat hard in the taste, with a matured tone. A combination I found dubious, but pleased the crowd. Many tasters were on a 97 point level and only isolated tasters were below 95 points.
99 - 1990 Barolo Cannubi Boschis, Sandrone
Dark, brick red colour. Sweet and strong smell of prune, leather and liquorice, but hard to place. The taste was genuine, focused and just lovely. Remarkable balanced with a super zippy after taste. Most of us agreed on 97 - 98 points and praised this wine for being atypical accessible at this stage of its life.
98+ - 1998 Creek Block Shiraz, Greenock Creek
Extremely dark, ruby colour. Lovely eucalyptus and unmistakable aussi in the nose. Potent, black berries. A taste going great guns, extremely full bodied and accessible, painful nice to drink. Aussi friends with thumbs up did judge the wine nearly perfect at 98 - 99 points and the more timid tasters :=) gave down to five points less.
97 - 1986 Ch Leoville Las Cases
Very dark, brick red colour. Decomposed leaves, and forest whispered Bordeaux. A grandiose, chilly feeling together with wax, candle-grease and oak. A very well-assembled taste in a fine balance towards the dry end. Many of the tasters did say as Parker, a few (including me) was a bit lower and some even higher than Parker. Remarkably for me, most tasters liked this better then the next.
100 - 1982 Ch Leoville Las Cases
Very dark, brick red colour. Piquant smell from cabernet and plums, stylish and somewhat reserved, and raisin traces from a warm vintage. The taste is very complete and harmonious, with a graceful mature component accompanied with lofty sweet tannins. I was on the high end with 97 points and the other tasters spread there points downwards to 93.
96-97 - 1996 Abadia Retuerta, Pago Valdebellon, Sardon del Duero
Dark, ruby to brick red colour. A spiciness, reminding of a slight oxidation disappeared after a while. An exciting smell of gingerbread and Christmas baking. Also very jammy. The taste is very much alike, spicy and exciting. This was maybe the most controversial wine of the reds, drawing points all the way from 90 to 98.
The red bonus wine
1999 Matallan, Telmo Rodrigues
Dark, bluish red colour. Luxurious oak and fruit, very young smell in fine balance, fresh and well made. Very good taste, very rough but accessible. This 100% Tempranillo wine might be to harsh for its own best. Points between 92 and 97, depending on its future.
Conclusions from this tasting
As can seen from the above ratings, we were not too consistent to Robert Parkers points.
First of all we seems to generally rate the wines a bit lower then Parker. I don't have the explanation for this, there might be several reasons :
Worse than above is the wide point range we seem to assign many wines.
There are of course individual preferences, but from such experienced group of tasters, one could possibly expect individual taste to be repressed in favour for a more general norm. This is a great problem so often seen from wide tasting panels consisting of individualists not sharing a common preference. And it is no point to calculate average values from such panel, because that only ends up with every wine getting almost the same point.
A single taster (or a concordant duo) does not have this problem, provided that the taster(s) are consistent with himself (themselves). I think this is Robert Parkers trade mark, he has (together with Pierre-Antoine Rovani) a distinctive wine norm, and he succeed to always stick to it. To put it straight, they are always predictable.
In the white flight, the Ch de Beaucastel was the surprise and the big deviation from Parkers point. Weather this depends on a galloping maturation, bad shipping or bad bottles is hard to know.
Among the red wines the ranking of Ermitage le Pavillon was the question mark. Will this wine put on personality in the bottle, enough to match its lofty point. Or do we see the beginning of a new trend of bringing more subtleties into traditionally sturdy wine types. Time will tell if the wines will benefit from this or it is a way to excuse that quality is slipping. Parker has brought this question into debate regading Robert Mondavi's 1997 vintage. Shuldn't he also question Chapoutier on the same principles.