Community Tasting Note
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Keith Levenberg wrote: 97 points
January 2, 2018 - This is a ravishing beauty of a wine, far more impressive than you'd guess from its original reviews or even the more recent CT impressions. It's true that it's light in weight for a Cheval Blanc, but that's more an issue of longevity than quality and it certainly compensates for its weight class with a staggering level of finesse. The texture is pure silk with a mouthfeel somewhere in between an Amoureuses and a Rougeard (and with Rougeard prices the way they are lately, the Cheval Blanc is now the QPR of the two!). Usually when Bordeaux is at its most refined, even at the top of the hierarchy, the material is heavier and thicker, more cashmere than silk. This, however, achieves a textural finesse that's rare even at the high echelons of Burgundy. The flavors are classic Cheval, clearly cab franc-dominant although the greenness noted in some older reviews is now gone, and it now features pure red fruit on a base of deeper-pitched earthy and tobacco flavors. A bit of barnyardy funk blew off after the first few minutes. The lighter weight should not suggest anything frail however because a glass's worth left over on the counter at room temperature was still basically unchanged the next day.
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