5/9/2024 - RuneSkoglund Likes this wine:

2010-modellen holder fremdeles godt på tanniner, men merker at de blir mere avslepne.
God, bæraktig lukt, med hint av kjeller.
Kjenner allerede på lukten at denne har utviklet seg fra innkjøp og test i 2021.

5/10/2024 - franinnyc Likes this wine:

Excellent. I am new to riojas - but the structure just terrific. Definitely young. Will try another bottle next year.

5/4/2024 - "Rhône Rider" wrote:

Stunning, flaske med brioche, grilla sitron, kalk. Ganske mye lengre enn forrige flaske for ca to år siden. Ettervern med blomster, røyk, evig lang ettersmak med revet sitronskall. Balanse ut av en annen verden. Min første 100-poenger. 100

5/1/2024 - SoleModel23 Likes this wine:

The wine that got me into wine.... I have opened up at least a case of this bottle after the infamous "ah-ha" moment when a friend opened one up for me, and I have never had another bottle replicate that experience........... Until this bottle! Wow, It truly left me speechless. In a really tough predicament not knowing whether to inhale it or save it all and wear it as cologne?! Oh my goodness, it was love at first glass allllll over again! The pencil shavings, the vanilla, the clove, the CANDY CANE?!?! So bright and distinctively Rioja, with a minute long finish! Rioja does NOT get better than this bottle, and I guarantee that, equating to its perfect 100 point score. Bravo

Unfortunately, I have noticed quite a bit of bottle variation with this vintage and producer, so I don't know when the next bottle I have of this will do this again....... but I guess it's a good thing I have 54 bottles left in the cellar to continue digging through ;))))

Drinking as beautiful as one could EVER want right now, but definitely will continue to age and evolve for the next 15 years, EASILY!! And I say that with all the confidence in the world. This wine, all the bottles I have drank, have no end in sight. 2040+

3/18/2024 - Cailles wrote:

It has been 18 months since I last tasted this vintage. Until now, I found it not overly expressive or layered but always with an unmatched elegance in structure. My ratings have consistently hovered between 93 and 94pts. Revisiting now, I've observed a significant evolution: it has finally intensified in both concentration and expressiveness, though at the slight expense of its finesse. Still, this was the best bottle so far. And it's also the first bottle that made me more confident about the longer-term potential of this wine. But contrary to critical opinion, I don't think that this will be the best big house 2008 (and btw, the 2012 always showed more promising and still does). 95/96pts

TN: Expressive right from the go and without much air. Layered and highly precise aromas of peach, lemon,white fruit, slate and saline minerality, a beautiful toffee and slight buttery note. Super mid-palate weight and long finish. Great freshness and a lot of cut. It’s no longer as fine and elegant as before but gained some edges but still well-built and time will bring that softness back. All in all a great Champagne to drink.

Decanting: No extensive decanting needed.

12/18/2023 - Purple Tooth wrote:

**So this is christmas,
And what have you done?
I have opened one of these,
And Im rowing in the sun.
This was beautiful yesterday. The weightlessness of this wine left me in awe. I dont know if its the wine, or the bubble package, or the temperature. It definitely becomes more toasty, almondy, and weightless as it warms in the glass. I think this is in perfect drinking window for phase 1 of its life and is not to be missed if you are looking for something airy and incredibly elegant. When Taittinger hits it, boy it nails it. This one is nailed in history...Very well done and a great representation of the hype around 2008. Drink or HOLD

10/16/2023 - galewskj wrote:

Left bank bordeaux 2008 and older (BLVD): 30 minute decant then poured into the bottle and drank about 1.5 hours later. Tons of funk, very rustic nose. Nice red fruit, tobacco, spice and loam. This is quite smooth, but it is rustic.

10/15/2023 - rocknroller wrote:

Monthly Tasting Group: Bordeaux 2008 and Older (BLVD Kitchen & Bar, Wayzata, MN): Small taste. 30 minute double decant. Nice cassis, blackberry liqueur, coarse tannins, anise, full bodied, has something of a hole from the mid palate on. 91+pts.

12/19/2023 - sdr Likes this wine:

Fully mature now, deep in its secondaries. Gold. Classic Krug flavors of hazelnut and brown butter with adequate acidity. Powerful luscious wine for a roast chicken. I’m slightly concerned about the acidity for the long term.

12/21/2023 - dalemosier Likes this wine:

I didn't decant - I should have - likely an hour. The taste and balance improved after about an hour in the glass

12/7/2023 - vesper9 wrote:

not so sure. maybe too young

2/9/2023 - mkolbu wrote:

Wine tasting Zurich with friends.

Decanted at noon, drunk from 19:30-23:30.

Not a good bottle, unbalanced with a sickening raspberry candy and sweet licorice smell and flavor. Never got any better and nobody enjoyed it much.

7/4/2023 - Benj wrote:

Extremely tight, this took over an hour’s decant to show anything at all. When it did it was very nice, though too oaky right now. It’s an awkward time for this wine. It needs another few years to start opening up. There was a touch of Brett in this bottle, which makes me nervous about the offset of continued aging, though I do find that the LRA wines typically handle Brett with some grace. I have thus far been less impressed with the Ardanzas of the 2010s than the 2000s.

4/14/2023 - NoTrollingerPlease Likes this wine:

Bürklin-Wolf Tasting with Nicola Libelli (Freiheit Vinothek, Ulm, Germany): Glass: Zalto Universal.
Tasted blind. No notes taken. Rounder, softer than the 2014 and 2013 before, warmer vintage. Nevertheless a beautful, ripe acidity. Good length. 89-90

2/13/2023 - libero wrote:

This 22 years old bottle is gone downhill, with a brownish color to high acid at finishing.

2/7/2023 - Anders Danielsen Lie Likes this wine:

Første flaske subtil kork. Urent preg over klassisk pauillac-nese. Neste som å ta sløret av, intenst duftende sexy cassis over seder og spice. Veldig sjenerøs, nydelig balansert i munn. Integrerte tanniner. 93-ish. Frukten er det mest imponerende ved denne

11/23/2021 - PSPatrick wrote:

First of three bottles I bought on auction recently (€65/bottle). Red fruit, strawberry, red cherry, dill, tobacco, and spices, with good acidity, partly resolved tannin, and very good length.

The remaining tannin seems grainy at first, but finds its balance after some time in the decanter. By day two, the tannin is fully resolved and flavors are very integrated. The fruit is riper than expected, but other than that this is a classic, old school Rioja.

12/16/2022 - JimHow Likes this wine:

Omg... 2014 Leoville Barton... With the possible exception of the 2002, the greatest Leoville Barton ever? This wine is stunning. Immaculate. So pure. 13.5% but it might as well be one of those 11.5%-ers we see occasionally from an era gone by, like from some vintage from the 1950s. I've had many a Barton. It has for decades ranked among my top 3-4 favorite estates since the earliest days of my passion for Bordeaux, which is now in its fourth decade. (The Langoa Barton has provided great joy over the years as well.) We have seen many changes in Bordeaux over the years, but Leoville Barton is "constant as the Northern Star, of whose true fixed and resting quality there is no fellow in the firmament." I gave the 2014 Calon Segur 100 points because it "blew me away." I score this 2014 Leoville Barton 98+ points, because I celebrate its understatedness.... It does NOT blow me away.... But I mean that as the ultimate compliment. I say to you that in some ways a lower score can be a higher achievement.... 2014 Leoville Barton is "better" because it is NOT a 100 point wine. It is NOT a Robert Parker wine. The universe is complicated. 100 is not always better than 98+. The smoothness of the tannins, the structure combined with elegance. The lingering finish. Light on its feet, drinking well now and for at least another thirty years, the whole nine yards. The 2014 vintage is a throwback to the golden era of Bordeaux, the decade of the 1980s. 2014 is 1988-like, one of my favorite Bordeaux vintages ever. Great bouquet, pure rich St. Julien purple color. I have always said that the greatest pinpoint in our solar system for the production of wine grapes is at that bend in the road on Route D2, at the stone wall where Pauillac meets St. Julien, where Latour and Léoville Las Cases meet, the neighborhood of Pichon Baron, Pichon Lalande, and the neighbors to the south, including that constant northern star, the soul of Bordeaux, Chateau Leoville Barton. To me this is EVERYTHING I look for in Bordeaux. The ultimate St. Julien. Breathtaking in its understatedness, the 2014 Chateau Leoville Barton.
Rating: 98+ points.

www.bordeauxwineenthusiasts.com

3/2/2021 - drwine2001 wrote:

A test run for this rarely released cuvée of Viña Ardanza. Decanted for 5 hours. Light garnet center. Strong fennel and pine resin. Lighter weight, some glycerine. There is nice red fruit underneath, some cocoa, and fine acidity, but the green elements dominate, and the finish is unrelentingly astringent due to the wood tannins. There are a number of things to like here if you can see your way past the herbaceous woodiness. Unfortunately for me, I just can't. It's another swing and a miss with La Rioja Alta, and I should know better by now than trying yet another bottling to see if I somehow find the magic. The style is just not for me.

With a nod to the comments below, sleeker, slightly sweeter, and more high toned, gentle menthol perfume after recorking this overnight, so there is hope for the future, but the greenness is in the genetic code of the winemaking at this property. There is no getting around that.

9/28/2022 - D_RICH wrote:

My 3rd of 8. This is finally starting to resemble the wine raved about in the reviews on this platform. One hour decant. Initially an off-putting scent that lifts to reveal an intensely aromatic old world nose. Concentrated and complex on the plate. As I noted 2 years ago, this is not for everyone, but for fans of old school Rioja, this is the real deal.

9/27/2022 - maaike2 wrote:

1 our in decanter. Strawberries and blackberries, touch of earth and leather, beautiful acidity. No mistakes. Limited in power and length. I think too early, hope former openness in 5 years.

7/3/2022 - AleksanderDye Likes this wine:

Lette røde frukter på nese, kirsebær og hint av anis, noe sødme, neste som sevje fra selje som også gir dybde

Elegant vin, Lette røde frukter, lyse syrlige kirsebær, ettersmak av litt toastet eik. Litt bjørnebær med nok luft

Trenge mye luft - gjerne 8 timer i karaffel, ellers er den litt enkel, men mye mer fylde med luft!

89-90 uten luft, 92-93 med luft!

5/9/2022 - boillatm Likes this wine:

Cinsault, Cabernet sauvignon and Carignan.

Bought 4 bottles for 34 CHF each last autumn on the occasion of a special deal offered by a wine shop in Zurich. (The whole stock of bottles put on sale were gone after one day.)
I intended to bring the first bottle to some friends for lunch. Based on the CTs, I opened the bottle the night before. Unfortunately, I fell ill during the night and I gifted the bottle without being able to taste it.
Second bottle opened for mother's day. Here also I opened the bottle the night before. Cork in a very bad shape but easily removed with a two-blade corkscrew.

Right upon pouring the wine and smelling it, I knew we would be drinking something special. I am unable to do justice to the complexity of aromas that we encountered upon drinking the bottle (although I can say that I didn't detect any cockroach smell). This wine manages to be light and powerful at the same time. As somebody described, it's something for Bordeaux lovers that is not Bordeaux.

All in all, a stunning wine and crazy quality for the price. I look forward to sharing my remaining bottles with good friends that don't know this producer.

1/31/2021 - rama Likes this wine:

Not decanted and tasted over a few hours. I was served this double blind and blew it, calling it a 15 year old Santa Rita Hills pinot noir! Its ripe, rich, high acid with very gentle tannin. Long creamy, saline finish.

A few hours of vigorous aeration and its vastly improved, picking up some weight. Cedar, cranberry, raisin. Sweet and rich.

12/30/2020 - MSheridan wrote:

Hmmm a bit disappointed here. I’m sure I’ll get berated for my score but this was far from expectation.
After all the hype from other CT reviews I had high hopes.

This bottle was all oak and acid.
Wood initially on the palate, a bit of sour cherry leading to more wood
High acidity and medium velvety tannins.

I’m sure (hope) the oak will integrate at a later stage to show its true credentials

12/25/2020 - lespapilles wrote:

Closed. Two bottles opened and tasted, with consistent notes. Neither was marked by TCA or brett, both were acid-driven and fairly simple. 1.5 hours of air did little to improve them. We have a few more, and will wait another 5 years to open.

12/25/2018 - pbmedder Likes this wine:

From magnum, Christmas '18, wonderful with turkey and pigs and blanket! Medium gold hue. Complex nose of peach, biscuit, toast, mushrooms, rich and honeyed. Palate still very much alive, lemon, baked apple, toast, honey, nutty finish. Utterly delicious, fresh and vibrant. Still with years left, but wonderful now.

3/3/2015 - SimonN Likes this wine:

Fabulous. Drinking brilliantly now - went well with Spanish cheeses and cured meats. The consensus seems to be that it will get even better. Thankfully I have several more so I can find out for myself if I show enough restraint.

I decanted just prior to drinking, but I don't think it was necessary. it was great after the first few minutes of being opened

2/25/2015 - leff wrote:

Decent wine, but nothing special.