2018 Château Cheval Blanc

Community Tasting Notes (13) Avg Score: 97.7 points

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  5/29/2023 - alexbhurst1678 wrote: 96 Points

  Silly smooth; opened up at zz's while watching Heat game; crispy fruit notes; finish is still super young.

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  11/1/2022 - Irish_Wine wrote: 97 Points

  Medjum ruby.
  
  Incredible nose - rich, refined, and decadent. Black plum, red plum, black cherry, sweet spices, cedar.
  
  Amazing intensity and concentration on the palate. Long, expanding and evolving finsh. What an amazing wine.
  
  *** Tasted as part of a walkaround 2018 Bordeaux tasting. Not full notes ***

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  1/2/2022 - sirpat00 Likes this wine: 98 Points

  Tasted blind. Sweet spices abound, caramel and cinnamon, fine smoky layers, herbs, while intense and ripe, the fruit profile manages to come across as pretty cool. Furthermore, there are meaty angles and you’ll also find cool minerality, cranberry and red berries and espresso – the latter is becoming more dominant over time in the glass. Perfectly balanced with seamlessly integrated tannin carrying a great sweet and fruity profile. Again coffee notes. Delicate, graceful and detailed. Second best Cheval Blanc I’ve had today, only bested by the 2015, slightly ahead of 2000, 2009, 1995 and in another league from 1980, 1983, 1990, 2010 (wasn’t ready) and 1998. I tasted this right next to Angélus 2016 and while that was one of the best Angélus to date as well, I couldn’t help but notice the difference in precision, number of layers and overall grace.

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  1/2/2022 - Cailles wrote: 99 Points

  Like many out there, I fear that many Bordeaux and especially right bank wines might be too massive, too ripe, too hot in 2018. But not this Cheval Blanc. Despite being this young, this Cheval is close to perfection. The epitome of elegance, without any hard edges yet with a beautiful tension and freshness, not a shred of over-ripeness and massive depth. I’m not a big scorer on potential but call it more like it is in the glass right now, so this 98/99 pts are the experience you can get from it today. This is just a WOW wine and certainly a candidate for perfection. So what was missing for the three digit score? The nose could have been a touch more expressive and certainly the tertiary complexity that will come with age.
  
  TN: Medium expressive on the very seductive yet so elegant nose full of fine dark red and blue berries, lots of floral notes, some wet earth notes and some spices. With time more and more signature espresso notes come forward. On the palate this is so elegant and soft, so much fine dark red berries, espresso, caramel, wet earth, some meaty notes, strong minerality, spices. The highlights are the unbelievable elegance and weightlessness, with ultra-fine tannins, absolute no hard edges, perfectly integrated perfect acidity, creamy texture, yet - as mentioned - no weight. Very long and complex finish with loads of espresso and pure blue and dark red fruit. Superbly complete and harmonious.
  
  Decanting: Decanted for roughly 60 mins, back in the bottle and consumed 2 hours later over a time span of another 2 hours in which the wine gained with every minute. A solid two hours in the decanter seems right at this point (but with young wines it’s always a bit dangerous to decant for too long).
  
  Glass: Conterno Sensory

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  11/23/2021 - nwebstar Likes this wine: 96 Points

  Bordeaux 2018 - Langtons tasting (Virtual with samples sent): Red and black fruited beauty with a certain lifted floral character. Dry herbs and mixed spices. A real X factor wine - something ethereal about it. Initially for me seemed a little looser in structure than others but eventually took it as a broader taste spectrum across the palate. “The Ethereal”

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