1983 vintage horizontal with >20 wines, mostly from Bordeaux. Key observations: 1/ Acceptable vintage for Champagne with DP over-delivering, 2/ Laville Haut Brion is a masterpiece among the whites, 3/ Bordeaux is going strong at 40 years of age with stand-outs Latour and Margaux. 4/ No need to chase any Napa’s from the vintage, 5/ off-piste Italians kept up impressively with Soldera an undisputed medalist.
Tasting note: Double-decanted. Dried leaves, wet earth, fresh red berry. Weightless palate, maintains harmony. This is good but couldn’t keep up with the heavy hitters of the vintage.
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Not having experience with this wine/vintage, I opened the bottle an hour before dinner. 5-10 minutes in the decanter while I rinsed the bottle, and then poured straight back in, corked, and placed into the wine carrier.
On first glass the somm graciously described the wine as having "some damp barnyard". My wife cut to the point and called it "wet diaper". Hard to say she was wrong. BUT, given a healthy swirl or ten in the glass, this wine shrugged off the musty-ness and was delightful. It's possible the immediate recorking didn't allow enough time to breathe. I'm reminded of an experience with an '82 Beychevelle that went much the same way but after a few hours cleared out all of the funk and was delicious. Maybe this is a similar kind of bottle variation.
Integrated, soft palate a mile wide with plenty of nuance to explore. Elegant and varied fruit. A bit thin on the finish given the expectations the mid set up. Just an absolutely delicious wine. Consumed over 2 hours and it kept getting better. I was happy to end the dinner with half a glass left of this, and we stayed late so I could take my time with it. When I revisit I will be allowing for plenty more air, as this wine was still going strong after 3 hours open.
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Next to the 83 Canon alongside it, this was less pungent on the nose, more refined, with some red and dark berry aromas interwoven with soil tones and cedary oak tones. Well balanced, very good wine.
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A good bottle; not as good as my prior ones. The nose shows some earth and mulch with the fruit relegated to more of the background. The palate, too, isn't as elegant as the other wines and shows a little bit of an iron character behind the leather and barnyard. This still has some of the merlot plumminess, but it's feeling aged and browning.
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a robust pomerol with big shoulders ! it is a perfect nose , a lot of power , probably less elegant than '82, but it will be the wine in the '80 that will last the longest ! cedar and tabaco in the nose, a little unbalanced with the mouth that is older but still very long and a nice smooth acidity ! this wine can still be served for a complete dinner with great grilled meat in the main course !
a great bottle !
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Pomerol night (Chicago, IL): Initially a bit musty and dirty on the nose, this got very good with air. No TCA here! Earthy and cedary, with some old plummy notes as well. Not dense on the palate, this certainly feels like it's on the downswing and that it's time to drink up. A bit herbal and thin, and with air, this developed a bit of a bloody/meaty note that was reminiscent of Northern Rhones.
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Wonderful acidity on opening that is subsiding nicely. Showing some of the dark, slightly sweet fruit underneath. This was likely once a very masculine wine that has now softened just enough to be really pretty. Great color, no bricking. Somewhat similar to the 1982 from the Thursday Pomerol dinner this year. But I found that to be a bigger, harder wine than this. Early on I found this to be better without food than with. It really allowed the layers of flavors to melt and last in my mouth. Wonderful purity of fruit, balanced by fantastic spice notes and rounded as a nearly perfectly balanced wine that had so much going on that over 5 hours, it was almost always better by itself than with food. Just awesome. 96-97
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Consistent with my last tasting note. A wonderful Pomerol that steers towards the end of its drinking window. Complex nose iwth tobacco, cured meat, blue fruit and sweet spices. Mild and silky palate. Drink up over the next 5 years. 96+
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Continuing the studies of the 1983 Bordeaux vintage. This VCC is truly spectacular. A super sexy Pomerol with lots of tension and aromatic intensity, a nice complexity. Compared to the Trotanoy 83 from a few weeks ago (93 pts), this has more of everything. While complex, the Cheval Blanc (97+ pts) had more depth and the slightly higher precision. I can‘t imagine this VCC getting better from here but it is not in decline whatsoever.
TN: Right out of the gates the nose is full of this wonderful soft meatiness which is so signature in aged Pomerols. Intense, expressive dark berries and ripe raspberries, a layer of fine tobacco and hints of truffles, a nice minerality complete the picture. Very precise and lively and so wonderfully harmonious. On the palate the wine is a bit thin at first but quickly gains weight and depth with more air, displaying all the before mentioned aromas with a touch more gravel and clay minerality as well as a layer of floral aromas and more blackberries and plum. Very good precision and aromatic intensity. The wine has a lot of tension, is wonderfully mellowed and creamy, nicely fresh and has a good medium+ length with lots plum and minerality on the finish.
Decanting: Not decanted and followed over 3 hours. It gained weight and depth with a bit of air but this impeccable bottle with high into neck fill would have needed not much more than a quick double decant.
Popped and poured, and followed over several hours without too much evolution. Very Pomerol on the nose. Perfumed and plummy with a hint of methol and a little barnyardy funk to go along with it. The palate shows a similar profile. Mature flavours of plum on the palate, with the sweetness to boot counterweighted by those earthy tones. At least based on this bottle, this is getting a little long in the tooth, this to me is nearing the end of the plateau, and I'd be inclined to drink the rest of mine up.
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Year-End Wine Dinner @ GWC!: Brought this tonight. Very Bordeaux in style from 1st nose. Red fruits, tobacco, greenness, with a nice tinge of spice and soil on the finish which was long. Enjoyed this a lot tonight and one of my top 2! Open up soon
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One of the stunners of the tasting! Mature but so delicious with layered flavors of dark red fruits and minerals. Leaner in style with a nutty maturity and a marvelous finish that floats across the tongue with incredible notes of sweet truffles and floral spice. Wow!
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Robe tuilee. Nez de cuir tabac réglisse sous-bois, mûres. Très présent en bouche, long, fin et harmonieux. Finalement encore en forme , pas tant sur le déclin
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30th Birthday Party: Perfect condition. A well-aged and beautifully expressive Pomerol. A ruby-brown color. Nose smells of dried currant, cherry pits, smoke and pickled beets. The tannins are still firm and grippy, and the acid holds it all together. The bright red cherry and cranberry fruit mixes with notes of roasted red pepper, meat drippings and some toasted nuts. Tasted blind, I guessed mid-1980s Napa Cab. The next day, the wine was even better. Much better than the other 1983 Bordeauxs I've tasted. Thanks, Scott!
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Saturday Tasting Group (Knightsbridge Wine Shop (Northbrook, IL)): Age showing. Bricking red maroon, tan color. Soy and rustic cherries, dried leaves. Molasses and light roast nuts. An elegant wine that shows elements of rust. Lighter hay and manure come through with leather iodine and red stone fruit. Palate shows lighter raspberries, earth and all spice. Very nice.
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Very different from the bottle had earlier in the month. Decanted just to get off of the sediment. This time the nose was much darker and had a dominant plummy note in the background, along with damp earth/leaves. The palate was better than the nose, but after about 20 minutes the wine began to fall apart. A decaying fruit note began to dominate and the overripe plumminess overtook the wine. My previous bottle was much better.
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Very pretty aromatics. Dark berries, bits of cocoa and an attractive herbal/minty note. Same dark/almost black fruits on the palate. Medium bodied palate with no hard edges. Moderate finish. I wouldn't hold any longer, though it did have just a bit of tannin remaining on the finish. Very enjoyable.
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Very ripe, fresh raspberry nose, lots of rich, berry fruit and minerals on the palate, needs 2 years to peak, medium/long finish. My #4, Group #6 tied.
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2/8/2024 - Dogshaus Likes this wine: 91 Points
Lovely old Bordeaux. Declining gracefully.
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11/25/2023 - sirpat00 wrote: 92 Points
1983 vintage horizontal with >20 wines, mostly from Bordeaux. Key observations: 1/ Acceptable vintage for Champagne with DP over-delivering, 2/ Laville Haut Brion is a masterpiece among the whites, 3/ Bordeaux is going strong at 40 years of age with stand-outs Latour and Margaux. 4/ No need to chase any Napa’s from the vintage, 5/ off-piste Italians kept up impressively with Soldera an undisputed medalist.
Tasting note:
Double-decanted. Dried leaves, wet earth, fresh red berry. Weightless palate, maintains harmony. This is good but couldn’t keep up with the heavy hitters of the vintage.
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1/6/2023 - billbounds Likes this wine:
Not having experience with this wine/vintage, I opened the bottle an hour before dinner. 5-10 minutes in the decanter while I rinsed the bottle, and then poured straight back in, corked, and placed into the wine carrier.
On first glass the somm graciously described the wine as having "some damp barnyard". My wife cut to the point and called it "wet diaper". Hard to say she was wrong. BUT, given a healthy swirl or ten in the glass, this wine shrugged off the musty-ness and was delightful. It's possible the immediate recorking didn't allow enough time to breathe. I'm reminded of an experience with an '82 Beychevelle that went much the same way but after a few hours cleared out all of the funk and was delicious. Maybe this is a similar kind of bottle variation.
Integrated, soft palate a mile wide with plenty of nuance to explore. Elegant and varied fruit. A bit thin on the finish given the expectations the mid set up. Just an absolutely delicious wine. Consumed over 2 hours and it kept getting better. I was happy to end the dinner with half a glass left of this, and we stayed late so I could take my time with it. When I revisit I will be allowing for plenty more air, as this wine was still going strong after 3 hours open.
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12/11/2022 - brooklynguy Likes this wine:
Next to the 83 Canon alongside it, this was less pungent on the nose, more refined, with some red and dark berry aromas interwoven with soil tones and cedary oak tones. Well balanced, very good wine.
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10/26/2022 - acyso wrote: 90 Points
A good bottle; not as good as my prior ones. The nose shows some earth and mulch with the fruit relegated to more of the background. The palate, too, isn't as elegant as the other wines and shows a little bit of an iron character behind the leather and barnyard. This still has some of the merlot plumminess, but it's feeling aged and browning.
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9/12/2022 - Beeck10 wrote: 95 Points
a robust pomerol with big shoulders ! it is a perfect nose , a lot of power , probably less elegant than '82, but it will be the wine in the '80 that will last the longest !
cedar and tabaco in the nose, a little unbalanced with the mouth that is older but still very long and a nice smooth acidity ! this wine can still be served for a complete dinner with great grilled meat in the main course !
a great bottle !
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8/25/2022 - acyso wrote: 93 Points
Pomerol night (Chicago, IL): Initially a bit musty and dirty on the nose, this got very good with air. No TCA here! Earthy and cedary, with some old plummy notes as well. Not dense on the palate, this certainly feels like it's on the downswing and that it's time to drink up. A bit herbal and thin, and with air, this developed a bit of a bloody/meaty note that was reminiscent of Northern Rhones.
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4/2/2022 - acyso wrote: flawed
Dim sum at Triple Crown (Chicago, IL): Corked.
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1/8/2022 - Jd6725 Likes this wine: 97 Points
Wonderful acidity on opening that is subsiding nicely. Showing some of the dark, slightly sweet fruit underneath. This was likely once a very masculine wine that has now softened just enough to be really pretty. Great color, no bricking. Somewhat similar to the 1982 from the Thursday Pomerol dinner this year. But I found that to be a bigger, harder wine than this. Early on I found this to be better without food than with. It really allowed the layers of flavors to melt and last in my mouth. Wonderful purity of fruit, balanced by fantastic spice notes and rounded as a nearly perfectly balanced wine that had so much going on that over 5 hours, it was almost always better by itself than with food. Just awesome. 96-97
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1/2/2022 - Philippe_C wrote: 95 Points
Nose of cabernet franc, poivrons mûrs... Loads of ultra ripe tannin, lenght of 30 sec.
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5/15/2021 - Collector1855 wrote: 96 Points
Consistent with my last tasting note. A wonderful Pomerol that steers towards the end of its drinking window. Complex nose iwth tobacco, cured meat, blue fruit and sweet spices. Mild and silky palate. Drink up over the next 5 years. 96+
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3/30/2021 - Cailles wrote: 96 Points
Continuing the studies of the 1983 Bordeaux vintage. This VCC is truly spectacular. A super sexy Pomerol with lots of tension and aromatic intensity, a nice complexity. Compared to the Trotanoy 83 from a few weeks ago (93 pts), this has more of everything. While complex, the Cheval Blanc (97+ pts) had more depth and the slightly higher precision. I can‘t imagine this VCC getting better from here but it is not in decline whatsoever.
TN: Right out of the gates the nose is full of this wonderful soft meatiness which is so signature in aged Pomerols. Intense, expressive dark berries and ripe raspberries, a layer of fine tobacco and hints of truffles, a nice minerality complete the picture. Very precise and lively and so wonderfully harmonious. On the palate the wine is a bit thin at first but quickly gains weight and depth with more air, displaying all the before mentioned aromas with a touch more gravel and clay minerality as well as a layer of floral aromas and more blackberries and plum. Very good precision and aromatic intensity. The wine has a lot of tension, is wonderfully mellowed and creamy, nicely fresh and has a good medium+ length with lots plum and minerality on the finish.
Decanting: Not decanted and followed over 3 hours. It gained weight and depth with a bit of air but this impeccable bottle with high into neck fill would have needed not much more than a quick double decant.
Glass: Conterno Sensory
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1/10/2021 - acyso wrote: 93 Points
Popped and poured, and followed over several hours without too much evolution. Very Pomerol on the nose. Perfumed and plummy with a hint of methol and a little barnyardy funk to go along with it. The palate shows a similar profile. Mature flavours of plum on the palate, with the sweetness to boot counterweighted by those earthy tones. At least based on this bottle, this is getting a little long in the tooth, this to me is nearing the end of the plateau, and I'd be inclined to drink the rest of mine up.
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12/22/2020 - dnnk88 Likes this wine: 94 Points
Year-End Wine Dinner @ GWC!: Brought this tonight. Very Bordeaux in style from 1st nose. Red fruits, tobacco, greenness, with a nice tinge of spice and soil on the finish which was long. Enjoyed this a lot tonight and one of my top 2! Open up soon
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12/22/2020 - Collector1855 wrote: 96 Points
During a year end wine dinner. Tasted blind. Tertiary nose, clearly Bordeaux, stemmy, CabFanc aroma profile, burgundian. Very good length.
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1/31/2020 - dream Likes this wine: 95 Points
One of the stunners of the tasting! Mature but so delicious with layered flavors of dark red fruits and minerals. Leaner in style with a nutty maturity and a marvelous finish that floats across the tongue with incredible notes of sweet truffles and floral spice. Wow!
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1/29/2020 - nywine68 wrote: 97 Points
Vieux Chateau Certan with François and Alexandre Thienpont (Vaucluse Townhouse, New York, organized by Zachys): Some slight mustiness but awesome complexity. Still has great acidity. Raspberries and blueberries with saddle leather. A laser beam of fruit pierces through the more mature earthy aromas.
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6/24/2017 - lambomiura Likes this wine: 92 Points
Robe tuilee. Nez de cuir tabac réglisse sous-bois, mûres. Très présent en bouche, long, fin et harmonieux. Finalement encore en forme , pas tant sur le déclin
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9/28/2013 - manonthemoon wrote: 92 Points
Small taste.
Served blind, guessed BDB with mostly merlot and CF.
Chocolate and Peppers with red fruit were the highlights.
Good wine.
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9/25/2013 - isaacjamesbaker wrote: 92 Points
30th Birthday Party: Perfect condition. A well-aged and beautifully expressive Pomerol. A ruby-brown color. Nose smells of dried currant, cherry pits, smoke and pickled beets. The tannins are still firm and grippy, and the acid holds it all together. The bright red cherry and cranberry fruit mixes with notes of roasted red pepper, meat drippings and some toasted nuts. Tasted blind, I guessed mid-1980s Napa Cab. The next day, the wine was even better. Much better than the other 1983 Bordeauxs I've tasted. Thanks, Scott!
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4/21/2012 - beezer6 wrote: 92 Points
Saturday Tasting Group (Knightsbridge Wine Shop (Northbrook, IL)): Age showing. Bricking red maroon, tan color.
Soy and rustic cherries, dried leaves. Molasses and light roast nuts. An elegant wine that shows elements of rust.
Lighter hay and manure come through with leather iodine and red stone fruit. Palate shows lighter raspberries, earth and all spice. Very nice.
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6/28/2011 - MatthewF wrote:
Very different from the bottle had earlier in the month. Decanted just to get off of the sediment. This time the nose was much darker and had a dominant plummy note in the background, along with damp earth/leaves. The palate was better than the nose, but after about 20 minutes the wine began to fall apart. A decaying fruit note began to dominate and the overripe plumminess overtook the wine. My previous bottle was much better.
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6/5/2011 - MatthewF wrote:
Very pretty aromatics. Dark berries, bits of cocoa and an attractive herbal/minty note. Same dark/almost black fruits on the palate. Medium bodied palate with no hard edges. Moderate finish. I wouldn't hold any longer, though it did have just a bit of tannin remaining on the finish. Very enjoyable.
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4/16/2011 - psmith wrote:
Great nose - black fruit and green herbal hints. Round. Very tannic frame that rounds out and integrates some with time. Nice.
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6/20/2009 - boreddoughboy wrote: 91 Points
Nose filled with herbs and vegitation. Nice finish, did not dissapoint.
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10/29/2008 - Rupert wrote: 92 Points
Horizontal tasting of 1983 bordeaux (Institute of Directors, London): Dark, lighter bodied than the other wines, plenty of sweet merlot fruit on the palate, very nice, but not as distinctive as the other wines today
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4/4/1996 - bestdamncab Likes this wine: 89 Points
Very ripe, fresh raspberry nose, lots of rich, berry fruit and minerals on the palate, needs 2 years to peak, medium/long finish. My #4, Group #6 tied.
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