30x 1955 & 1961 (mostly Bdx): As always, Pape Clement did not disappoint with its typical seductiveness and ripeness. Yes, it‘s not as deep as the best wines in this great vintage but it‘s just so much fun to drink and without any fault. I would drink that every day.
TN: Dark brooding nose with smoke, dark fruits, wet earth and tobacco. Super soft, balanced and creamy palate with dark fruit, coffee and tobacco. Not that complex but well delineated and with and inviting, round frame and a pleasant finish. 92/93 pts.
Decanting: Not decanted, good from the go.
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Grand 1961 vs 1955 vintage tasting (Fribourg): Big 1961 vs 1955 tastings including 10 direct match-ups and 11 individual wines from 1961. The tasting was conducted in flights of 4, single-blind and with no previous decant with all bottles opened 1h prior to start. The line-up was dominated by Bordeaux reds, but also included 5 Sauternes, 1 Champagne, 3 Burgundy reds and 1 Ribera del Duero. The following observations are worth mentioning: i) 1961 generally came across as a better vintage today than 1955, ii) the performance correlated with the 1855 classification, iii) The most outstanding wines were outside of the Bordeaux reds with Veuve Clicquot Rosé '61, Vega Sicilia Unico '61 (both 97) and La Tour Blanche '61 (96) worth mentioning, iv) Top-performing Bordeaux was Margaux (95) in 1961 and Mouton in 1955. List of wines included in the tasting story.
Tasting note: Intense with roasted coffee beans, smoke, dried herbs, but not much fruit left. Juicy palate with some aging notes in decent balance. Even if not overly complex, there was depth to this and a high level of enjoyability.
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bottle, fill and cork all excellent. Still dark and needing decanting, opens up with goudron, leather and blackberry. Some astringency that never dissipates. Not an exemplar of the great '61 vintage and a little past best. A good old claret, but not great.
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Not a great fill level, but the bottle turned out to be amazing. Wonderful nose, notes of chocolate, sweet dark fruit, dried fruit, herbs, tobacco, leather. On the palate harmonious, very balanced and long. 93-95
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Lots of forest floor and wet leaves here, getting richer and sweeter with air. Plenty of interest, but maybe not the best bottle. More interesting than enjoyable. 90-91pts maybe
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Very well preserved with the concentration of the vintage apparent. Nice balance and held reasonably well in the glass for a couple of hours. "Charming" as my table mates noted. Yet more interesting from an academic standpoint than as a tasty drink. Probably better ten years ago.
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Somewhat questionable fill, but great color. Turned out to be a truly great wine. Aromas of scorched earth and deep plum fruit followed onto the palate in spades. While clear signs of maturity and resolved tannins, offered up copious level of deep ripe sweet underlying red fruits and gave tremendous pleasure. Well balanced, but made in a lush denser extracted style that was hitting many pleasure points. Really outperformed my expectations and was clear WOTN just beating out a wonderful 1978 Beaucastel. Slight dirty component was only reason this did not score even higher.
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Color was medium red/brick. Opaque and cloudy, would have guessed this was older than the 49 by appearance.The nose really jumps out, started as a earth tones, morphing into sweet red fruits, plums, burnt sugar and smoke. Elegant mouthfeel, plate of red fruits, dried black cherry, leather and spice. Well into its tertiary phase, the wine is nuanced and elegant.
Really special wine, beautifully aged, fully mature. Great experience to drink this especially against an equally well preserved 1949...
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One of the most delightful and ethereal bottles of Bordeaux I have had. The nose is elegant, complex and engaging. You get notes of tobacco, sweet earth, fresh flowers and briary fruits. It is silky in the mouth with layers of sweet fruit that envelop the palate. It builds and has all sorts of savoury nuance. Tannins are ripe, sweet and supportive and it has remarkable persistence. It is a wine that feels absolutely complete, drinking very much at its apogee.
Smoke, burning campfire embers, tobacco, earth and cherry notes create the nose. The wine is fully mature, with that beautiful patina of aged silky cassis in the medium bodied finish.
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We drank the 61 Pape Clement along side the 61 Lafon-Rochet. An interesting comparison. The Pape Clement was the more hedonistic, presenting an intriguing kaleidoscope of fruits. The Lafon-Rochet was pure, with a beautiful sweetness. Both improved over an hour, which was surprising. Both had low shoulder fills.
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From a nice looking bottle with a very high shoulder fill, this wine had a red center with orange rims. The medium+ intensity nose showed black cherries, plums, leather, and brown spices.
In the mouth, the wine was medium bodied with a silky texture and a long finish. As expected, it needed 3+ hours to come around and show its best. It had fantastic balance.
This bottle tasted a bit fruitier than the last bottle I had. While this will last, I see no reason to wait. Enjoy!
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Deep crimson with a hint of bricking at the rim. Nose of sweet cherries, vanilla, honey, plum and leather, with a bit of moist earth and leather. First on palate with the sweet, ripe red fruits. Extending the nose with strawberries. Then moving on to earth, wet stones, toast and vanilla. Finish with leather and cigar box. This was an extraordinary bottle stored beautifully since release. Thank you, Tom!
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Dinner with Sierra Doc (Copperopolis, CA): Color: Brick with a pale orange brick meniscus Smell: Earth, faint bell pepper, dried black & blue fruits, faint smokiness, leather, and mild tobacco Taste: Elegant. Dried red and blue fruits with a rustic twist as mushrooms, earth, and faint hints of soy came through. Overall: Light-medium body, medium- fruit, medium-acidity, and mild almost completely resolved tannins with a medium- length finish. Outstanding.
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1961 Pape Clement offers smoke, cigar box, truffle, spicy black cherry, forest floor and tar scents. This medium/full bodied, fully mature, Pessac Leognan wine finishes with a smoky, tobacco and dark cherry sensation.
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From a great looking bottle with a top shoulder fill, this wine had a deep red center and tawny rims. The high intensity nose of wet stones, red fruit, tabacco, and soil left no doubt (blind) that it was Graves.
In the mouth it was medium bodied with incredible balance. The sweet fruit was offset nicely by light, fully integated tannin and moderate acidity. This wine was good right when it was poured and got better from there for the next hour. It appears to be at its peak and it should enjoy a slow, graceful decline. Enjoy!
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Absolutely beautiful. Clearly a well stored bottle. Top fill, in great shape. Sheer elegance. As it opened it kept blossoming. Beautiful violets, earth and tobacco spice, and wonderful minerality. Also a bit of dried cherry. Had a very slight leanness and a lack of length on the finish. Drink now, but will probably hang in there for a good 8-10 years.
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Slightly better bottle than the previous, more robust fruit flavours due maybe to a slightly higher base neck fill level. Pale, almost light magenta in colour. The nose again is intriguing with huge tobacco, clove, charred oak and red cherry scents. With some air, it had a slight orangy-orange pekoe tea-like smell. Replays of these on the palate, still maintaining decent acidity and a rather short-medium finish. Not as long as the previous bottle.Drink up. Still so much pleasure from such an old bottle.
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MNSC - Kevin (French Window): ripe and sweet. nose of smoke and cigar in the same vein as La Mission and Haut Brion. started well but died fairly quickly in glass.
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Not decanted but kept upright for a day to avoid sediment in the glass. Rose colour, light crimson with a very intense nose of tobacco, oak and some clove intertwined, and after some 30 minutes of air, I smelled scents of wild cherries. The nose was very enticing leading to a sour/wild cherry and tobacco flavoured palate. The tannins are completely resolved but the acidity was still there and it kept the wine alive. The finish was very very long and I kept tasting it more than 1 minute after it was consumed. Past it's peak by about 7-9 years(I think) but it was not dead by any means and alive and quite pleasurable. 91+ I have one more for near term consumption.
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20 mins in decanter. Intense ancient fruit - deeply stewed, bovril, tobacco, layers of complexity. Good balance, not fading, enjoyable but very very old - beyond being wine.
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Wines on Thursday (Bellavitae): Fantastic. Intensely aromatic with burning cigar tobacco, and every sip of this is like taking a long, deep drag on a cigar, so intensely smoky is the flavor. We're not talking "notes" of tobacco, we're talking about a box of Cubans somehow transmogrified into a liquid. The palate presence is plush and mouthfilling, like a plume of smoke, deep and dark and plummy (at least to the extent any of this is still evocative of fruit, which it mostly isn't). This is right up there with the '61 Palmer I tasted a few months ago. It doesn't have the delineated dimension of the Palmer but is just as well composed and at least as interesting in its flavor.
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Pre-Harlan Warm-up at Brad England's House: Mature red color. The nose gives a subdued aroma of hickory smoke. In the mouth this is soft with mineral and red fruit. Nicely balanced. The structure and taste reminded me of the 1961 Lynch Bages tasted recently -- although the Lynch Bages was a much better wine.
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Harlan Warm-Up Dinner (Brad's House, Minneapolis): Interesting nose that I can only describe as barbequed leather. Medium amber color. Caramel and dusty red fruits. Fully mature; the fruit is still holding on. Long finish.
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Ray Goder Dinner at Caliterra (Caliterra): Pale pink/red color. Medium aroma of bright red fruit and pizza notes. Nice round red fruit with great freshness and balance. 93+ pts.
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A small 1961 tasting; in 1986 (At my home): Less colour than its peers in this '61 tasting with a browning rim, a very ripe bouquet with iron, tea, peppers, gentle wood and a hint of sweetness; sufficient body, nice bitters, quite elegant, bu missing persistence.
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10/17/2021 - Cailles wrote: 92 Points
30x 1955 & 1961 (mostly Bdx): As always, Pape Clement did not disappoint with its typical seductiveness and ripeness. Yes, it‘s not as deep as the best wines in this great vintage but it‘s just so much fun to drink and without any fault. I would drink that every day.
TN: Dark brooding nose with smoke, dark fruits, wet earth and tobacco. Super soft, balanced and creamy palate with dark fruit, coffee and tobacco. Not that complex but well delineated and with and inviting, round frame and a pleasant finish. 92/93 pts.
Decanting: Not decanted, good from the go.
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9/20/2021 - sirpat00 wrote: 93 Points
Grand 1961 vs 1955 vintage tasting (Fribourg): Big 1961 vs 1955 tastings including 10 direct match-ups and 11 individual wines from 1961. The tasting was conducted in flights of 4, single-blind and with no previous decant with all bottles opened 1h prior to start. The line-up was dominated by Bordeaux reds, but also included 5 Sauternes, 1 Champagne, 3 Burgundy reds and 1 Ribera del Duero. The following observations are worth mentioning: i) 1961 generally came across as a better vintage today than 1955, ii) the performance correlated with the 1855 classification, iii) The most outstanding wines were outside of the Bordeaux reds with Veuve Clicquot Rosé '61, Vega Sicilia Unico '61 (both 97) and La Tour Blanche '61 (96) worth mentioning, iv) Top-performing Bordeaux was Margaux (95) in 1961 and Mouton in 1955. List of wines included in the tasting story.
Tasting note:
Intense with roasted coffee beans, smoke, dried herbs, but not much fruit left. Juicy palate with some aging notes in decent balance. Even if not overly complex, there was depth to this and a high level of enjoyability.
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8/18/2021 - BradE wrote:
A sublime bottle of 61 Pape Clement. Soy, earth, leather. Great when an old bottle shows this well.
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12/25/2018 - vindictive wrote:
bottle, fill and cork all excellent. Still dark and needing decanting, opens up with goudron, leather and blackberry. Some astringency that never dissipates. Not an exemplar of the great '61 vintage and a little past best. A good old claret, but not great.
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8/24/2018 - rossi.wine wrote: 94 Points
Not a great fill level, but the bottle turned out to be amazing. Wonderful nose, notes of chocolate, sweet dark fruit, dried fruit, herbs, tobacco, leather. On the palate harmonious, very balanced and long. 93-95
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9/22/2017 - JulianSkeels wrote: 90 Points
Lots of forest floor and wet leaves here, getting richer and sweeter with air. Plenty of interest, but maybe not the best bottle. More interesting than enjoyable. 90-91pts maybe
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9/12/2017 - RayOB wrote: 88 Points
Drank at 67
Forest floor earth and funk. Past its best.
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5/6/2017 - sdr Likes this wine: 91 Points
Very well preserved with the concentration of the vintage apparent. Nice balance and held reasonably well in the glass for a couple of hours. "Charming" as my table mates noted. Yet more interesting from an academic standpoint than as a tasty drink. Probably better ten years ago.
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10/9/2016 - KenK Likes this wine: 96 Points
Somewhat questionable fill, but great color. Turned out to be a truly great wine. Aromas of scorched earth and deep plum fruit followed onto the palate in spades. While clear signs of maturity and resolved tannins, offered up copious level of deep ripe sweet underlying red fruits and gave tremendous pleasure. Well balanced, but made in a lush denser extracted style that was hitting many pleasure points. Really outperformed my expectations and was clear WOTN just beating out a wonderful 1978 Beaucastel. Slight dirty component was only reason this did not score even higher.
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1/19/2016 - walkerjfw wrote: 92 Points
Another Epic Dinner in Zurich w/CVA, Benoit, Andrew...adding Paolo (Moevenpick 20/20): First experience with this chateau, CVA shared this bottle, impeccable condition, well stored high fill. Drank next to the 1949 Pape Clement. Open for about 30 minutes prior to drinking.
Color was medium red/brick. Opaque and cloudy, would have guessed this was older than the 49 by appearance.The nose really jumps out, started as a earth tones, morphing into sweet red fruits, plums, burnt sugar and smoke. Elegant mouthfeel, plate of red fruits, dried black cherry, leather and spice. Well into its tertiary phase, the wine is nuanced and elegant.
Really special wine, beautifully aged, fully mature. Great experience to drink this especially against an equally well preserved 1949...
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9/5/2015 - Jeremy Holmes wrote:
One of the most delightful and ethereal bottles of Bordeaux I have had. The nose is elegant, complex and engaging. You get notes of tobacco, sweet earth, fresh flowers and briary fruits. It is silky in the mouth with layers of sweet fruit that envelop the palate. It builds and has all sorts of savoury nuance. Tannins are ripe, sweet and supportive and it has remarkable persistence. It is a wine that feels absolutely complete, drinking very much at its apogee.
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3/6/2015 - BradE wrote: flawed
DOA.
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2/3/2015 - Jeff Leve wrote: 92 Points
Smoke, burning campfire embers, tobacco, earth and cherry notes create the nose. The wine is fully mature, with that beautiful patina of aged silky cassis in the medium bodied finish.
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3/30/2014 - dcwino wrote: 92 Points
2013 editon of En Primeur - Kelly and Kevin’s excellent adventure; 3/26/2014-4/1/2014 (Mostly in Bordeaux and a night in Paris): Clearly an old Bordeaux, my guess was from the 50s. Completely tertiary shy nose, plum, dry cherries, cedar and mint. Quite silky, soft and fully resolved tannins. A hint of oxidative note. A bit more advanced than what I expected.
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2/22/2013 - BradE wrote:
We drank the 61 Pape Clement along side the 61 Lafon-Rochet. An interesting comparison. The Pape Clement was the more hedonistic, presenting an intriguing kaleidoscope of fruits. The Lafon-Rochet was pure, with a beautiful sweetness. Both improved over an hour, which was surprising. Both had low shoulder fills.
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12/31/2012 - fclarity wrote: 94 Points
From a nice looking bottle with a very high shoulder fill, this wine had a red center with orange rims. The medium+ intensity nose showed black cherries, plums, leather, and brown spices.
In the mouth, the wine was medium bodied with a silky texture and a long finish. As expected, it needed 3+ hours to come around and show its best. It had fantastic balance.
This bottle tasted a bit fruitier than the last bottle I had. While this will last, I see no reason to wait. Enjoy!
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7/15/2012 - PDavisMarble wrote: 95 Points
Deep crimson with a hint of bricking at the rim. Nose of sweet cherries, vanilla, honey, plum and leather, with a bit of moist earth and leather. First on palate with the sweet, ripe red fruits. Extending the nose with strawberries. Then moving on to earth, wet stones, toast and vanilla. Finish with leather and cigar box. This was an extraordinary bottle stored beautifully since release. Thank you, Tom!
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5/16/2012 - Kirk Grant wrote:
Dinner with Sierra Doc (Copperopolis, CA): Color: Brick with a pale orange brick meniscus
Smell: Earth, faint bell pepper, dried black & blue fruits, faint smokiness, leather, and mild tobacco
Taste: Elegant. Dried red and blue fruits with a rustic twist as mushrooms, earth, and faint hints of soy came through.
Overall: Light-medium body, medium- fruit, medium-acidity, and mild almost completely resolved tannins with a medium- length finish. Outstanding.
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4/30/2012 - canan wrote: 92 Points
Bordeaux 1961 - Mini Horisontal (Le Sommelier, Copenhagen): Nose: Leather and coffee with a little red currant.
Palate: Juicy red currants with coffee and leather. Ends with a metallic note. Complex and a little sweet.
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10/7/2011 - Jeff Leve wrote: 92 Points
1961 Pape Clement offers smoke, cigar box, truffle, spicy black cherry, forest floor and tar scents. This medium/full bodied, fully mature, Pessac Leognan wine finishes with a smoky, tobacco and dark cherry sensation.
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5/22/2011 - fclarity wrote: 94 Points
From a great looking bottle with a top shoulder fill, this wine had a deep red center and tawny rims. The high intensity nose of wet stones, red fruit, tabacco, and soil left no doubt (blind) that it was Graves.
In the mouth it was medium bodied with incredible balance. The sweet fruit was offset nicely by light, fully integated tannin and moderate acidity. This wine was good right when it was poured and got better from there for the next hour. It appears to be at its peak and it should enjoy a slow, graceful decline. Enjoy!
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4/29/2011 - Winemusic wrote: 97 Points
Absolutely beautiful. Clearly a well stored bottle. Top fill, in great shape. Sheer elegance. As it opened it kept blossoming.
Beautiful violets, earth and tobacco spice, and wonderful minerality. Also a bit of dried cherry.
Had a very slight leanness and a lack of length on the finish. Drink now, but will probably hang in there for a good 8-10 years.
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6/21/2010 - mimik wrote: 92 Points
Slightly better bottle than the previous, more robust fruit flavours due maybe to a slightly higher base neck fill level. Pale, almost light magenta in colour. The nose again is intriguing with huge tobacco, clove, charred oak and red cherry scents. With some air, it had a slight orangy-orange pekoe tea-like smell. Replays of these on the palate, still maintaining decent acidity and a rather short-medium finish. Not as long as the previous bottle.Drink up. Still so much pleasure from such an old bottle.
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4/25/2010 - Lord Rayas wrote: 92 Points
MNSC - Kevin (French Window): ripe and sweet. nose of smoke and cigar in the same vein as La Mission and Haut Brion. started well but died fairly quickly in glass.
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4/11/2010 - mimik wrote: 91 Points
Not decanted but kept upright for a day to avoid sediment in the glass. Rose colour, light crimson with a very intense nose of tobacco, oak and some clove intertwined, and after some 30 minutes of air, I smelled scents of wild cherries. The nose was very enticing leading to a sour/wild cherry and tobacco flavoured palate. The tannins are completely resolved but the acidity was still there and it kept the wine alive. The finish was very very long and I kept tasting it more than 1 minute after it was consumed. Past it's peak by about 7-9 years(I think) but it was not dead by any means and alive and quite pleasurable. 91+ I have one more for near term consumption.
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12/24/2009 - presterjohn wrote:
20 mins in decanter. Intense ancient fruit - deeply stewed, bovril, tobacco, layers of complexity. Good balance, not fading, enjoyable but very very old - beyond being wine.
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11/6/2008 - Keith Levenberg wrote: 99 Points
Wines on Thursday (Bellavitae): Fantastic. Intensely aromatic with burning cigar tobacco, and every sip of this is like taking a long, deep drag on a cigar, so intensely smoky is the flavor. We're not talking "notes" of tobacco, we're talking about a box of Cubans somehow transmogrified into a liquid. The palate presence is plush and mouthfilling, like a plume of smoke, deep and dark and plummy (at least to the extent any of this is still evocative of fruit, which it mostly isn't). This is right up there with the '61 Palmer I tasted a few months ago. It doesn't have the delineated dimension of the Palmer but is just as well composed and at least as interesting in its flavor.
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10/13/2006 - Dave Dalluge wrote:
Pre-Harlan Warm-up at Brad England's House: Mature red color. The nose gives a subdued aroma of hickory smoke. In the mouth this is soft with mineral and red fruit. Nicely balanced. The structure and taste reminded me of the 1961 Lynch Bages tasted recently -- although the Lynch Bages was a much better wine.
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10/13/2006 - Siggy wrote:
Harlan Warm-Up Dinner (Brad's House, Minneapolis): Interesting nose that I can only describe as barbequed leather. Medium amber color. Caramel and dusty red fruits. Fully mature; the fruit is still holding on. Long finish.
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6/17/2006 - Burgundy Al wrote: 92 Points
Old Wine Dinner (Caliterra -Chicago IL): Mature red and black fruit with signs of having been ripe. Nicely evolved and matured with spice hints on finish.
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6/1/2006 - winefool wrote: 93 Points
Ray Goder Dinner at Caliterra (Caliterra): Pale pink/red color. Medium aroma of bright red fruit and pizza notes. Nice round red fruit with great freshness and balance. 93+ pts.
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9/1/1997 - sdr Likes this wine: 88 Points
Hugh’s bottle. Smooth, reserved and rather elegant. Enjoyable. Well preserved.
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11/1/1993 - sdr wrote: 87 Points
Hugh’s bottle. At the Colony Bistro, vs. ‘61 Haut-Brion. Intense smoky Graves character. Lightening up and becoming astringent.
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1/27/1986 - FransS wrote: 86 Points
A small 1961 tasting; in 1986 (At my home): Less colour than its peers in this '61 tasting with a browning rim, a very ripe bouquet with iron, tea, peppers, gentle wood and a hint of sweetness; sufficient body, nice bitters, quite elegant, bu missing persistence.
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