Community Tasting Note
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CheviotCellar Likes this wine: 90 points
March 11, 2021 - Its nice, agree with the other reviews. Tannins are approachable but I think flavors will deepen and expand with more years. We’ll wait 3-5 on the next bottle. Probably needs 10 years but who has that kind of time?
7 people found this helpful 6,790 views
13 Comments
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Mark1npt commented:
3/12/21, 8:45 PM - I like your thinking.......it needs soem time but how much time do any of us really have? Drinking wine that isn't quite perfect yet, beats not hanging around to drink it at all!
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Mhbeaune commented:
3/13/21, 1:17 AM - Love the post AND the comment, both so true. I shall wait a little as I hope to have some time . LOL
The problem of time is why I have stopped buying, as far as humanly possible.
That said I seem to still have a human weakness and buy, if only occasionally, but not Bordeaux en-primeur as there is no value in it and not enough time me thinks ! That said I still have a weakness for Chateau d’Issan ! -
Mark1npt commented:
3/13/21, 5:11 AM - Ha! I'm trying to stop buying but it's not working! I did stop my BDX futures though. I need to drink what's chilling in the cellar over the next 25 years, I hope!
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Mhbeaune commented:
3/13/21, 6:16 AM - I’m with Mark if I live long enough I should get through most of my ‘current’ cellar but future purchases MUST be for near term drinking AND NOT wishful thinking with regards to my personal longevity. I will plan fo 90 and settle for 10 more years from whatever age I am at the time.
That said friends, with a taste for wine, will appreciate my demise ! -
Mark1npt commented:
3/13/21, 6:29 AM - I'd rather drink with my friends now than leave a whole cellar to my sons!
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CheviotCellar commented:
3/15/21, 4:22 PM - I love the philosophical comments here. I really enjoy drinking wine. The delayed gratification of cellaring is always fun but so is trying a lot of wine, and at different points along their maturation spectrum.🙂🍷
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Mark1npt commented:
3/15/21, 5:09 PM - So true CC....so much fun drinking/playing with these bottles over the years!
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Jake Barnes commented:
3/28/21, 6:08 PM - I’m 51 years old and only began seriously learning about Bordeaux wine and collecting about 3-ish years ago. I’ve found that I love fully mature Bordeaux wines—especially the kind that can take 20+ years to completely develop. In light of this, I’ve more or less come to accept the fact that it’s better for me at my age to buy already aged wines on the secondary market and through library releases than to accumulate many cases of young wines and age them myself. I would like to have done what you all have done in that respect, but time just isn’t on my side at this point, I think. I pay a massive premium doing it my way, it’s true, but that’s the trade off.
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Mark1npt commented:
3/28/21, 6:24 PM - Jake, I'm 63 and only started about 4-5 years ago with BDX.....I almost exclusively have bought in the secondary market, all aged BDX and am aging them more. Yes, a few recent vintages on release but not a ton as I don;t have a ton of time to wait for them! You, my friend have a lot more!!!
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CheviotCellar commented:
3/28/21, 6:29 PM - Hi Jake. Im younger than you but also coming to the conclusion that buying older wine at a premium is worth it for a few reasons. 1) there’s higher assurance the vintage is actually good. Today everything from Bordeaux is “amazing”, an “incredible vintage”, “one to put away in the cellar” etc. Who knows if that will hold true in 20 or 30 years? If several folks rate an older wine as being in a good spot, it usually is worth buying. 2) if you buy a vintage wine and its corked, many vendors will do something about it within 6 months of purchase... good luck getting anything 20 years later, which is related to my next point 3) bottle conditioning isn’t my problem. What if the power goes out in July for 3 days, an earthquake, etc. Keeping anything in good shape for 20 years takes time and money, i.e electricity, storage space, opportunity cost of filling up one wine and not another. 4) inflation is a real thing... buy a ‘94 vintage today for $200 that was $40 at release. That sounds like a great deal but what if you put the $40 in the stock market, etc. You’d break even at worse and probably came out ahead by allowing your money to compound, plus you’ve eliminated risks 1-3 above. Really a fun topic to debate. I do have a decent amount of wines cellaring but pretty much everything we’ve bought in the COVID era is drink now.
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Jake Barnes commented:
3/28/21, 6:50 PM - Thanks for the perspectives! I appreciate both of your views.
Mark, I guess I kind of do what you do, really—I tend to buy some well-aged wines and then some that are nearly there and take them across the goal line.
Cheviot, you made some really excellent points, a few of which I hadn’t really considered, especially the fact that by buying wines on the secondary market we escape the hype of the vintage reports. I see a lot of people on CT reporting on old wines they bought as futures that just didn’t pan out. Those of us who buy on the secondary market years later have the benefit of hind sight and get to it tiptoe through tough vintages, like 2003, for instance, where you need to avoid the really burned stuff.
Here is something else to consider, too. My father collected Bordeaux wines. He’s now 86 and in really great health—lives alone and cooks for himself, etc.—but a few years ago, he decided he valued living independently more than making it through the wonderful cellar he’d accumulated. Let’s face it. One’s balance doesn’t get better as one ages—and alcohol doesn’t help. Consequently, my dad decided to quit drinking entirely and now has a number of tremendous old bottles and cases he will never enjoy—by choice. So there is that to consider as well. It may not be that we don’t live long enough to make it through our wines, we may not want to make it through them! (Can’t believe I just said that. Hah!). -
CheviotCellar commented:
3/28/21, 7:19 PM - JB... very interesting perspective on your dad and how tastes and circumstances change as we age. You never know when health could be different, or if you fall in love with Priorat and stop liking Napa cabs, etc. Hopefully one day my daughter will enjoy drinking what I can’t. But there are no guarantees even with a great family business or vacation home. Life can be fickle. All the more reason to buy and drink what you love now.
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Mark1npt commented:
3/28/21, 7:56 PM - All interesting opinions, folks. And all very valid points. Anything can happen to any of us at any time, including the infamous change in palate! OMG, that would be terrible!