1983 Dominus Estate

Community Tasting Notes (51) Avg Score: 91.9 points

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  1/22/2024 - wineton.mee wrote: 92 Points

  First ever vintage of Dominus and this is exactly why I love old Napas. Really fresh and vibrant on the nose. Ripe cherries, dark plums, green peppers, tobacco and leather. The palate is fading but still offers pleasure and all that tertiary notes hardly reflects the age. Got some alcoholic kick at the back. The ripeness probably suggests the origin of this bottle, and guesses were mostly around Loire Valley and 2013/2014. Held up well into Day 2.

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  12/31/2023 - Cailles wrote: 93 Points

  20 Top Wines of the 1983 Vintage: Dominus vs Opus 1983. The Dominus (93pts) is as Bordeaux-esque as a wine can be, though it is not showing that much complexity. Nevertheless, its debut vintage is noteworthy, especially considering 1983’s challenges in Napa Valley. The Opus (90pts) couldn‘t hide the difficult vintage that well, showing a bit simple, albeit without fault.
  
  TN: Medium- expressive nose with dark fruit and minerality. On the palate more expressive with intense minerality, a still intact nice and intense black fruit core, tobacco, and herbs. The tannins are fine but still with some edges, good freshness and tension, no excess weight. This is certainly not a very deep wine but the minerality core and the clear black fruit is a throwback to classic Bordeaux with that aristocratic feel.
  
  Decanting: Double decanted a few hours before consumption. It needed the air and opened further in the glass. I would decant it for at least two hours.

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  11/25/2023 - G_H wrote: 93 Points

  40 years on: A global 1983 retrospective: Not as great as another bottle I had a couple of years ago, but still very good. Intense, expressive nose, slightly lactic with some chocolate notes.

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  11/25/2023 - sirpat00 wrote: 93 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. Cassis jam but also fresher type of fruit, without appearing too sweet or overripe. Slightly lactic touch, also dried leaves. A fresh and moderately dense palate. Rather juicy still but lacking smoothness. Clearly better than Opus One ’83, but not quite on the level of the Dominus in the 90ies. Probably not a vintage to chase.

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  7/13/2023 - rc@ughey wrote: 93 Points

  Perhaps the most surprising wine of the night due to how young it showed. Blind I might have guessed something like 2000. Still structured and fresh as a daisy. Lovely too, although predictably neither as complex nor as elegant as the Margaux or Palmer. It was similar in impression to the Latour.

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