So much smarter than a pretty recalcitrant bottle in July. Warm, rounded, vanilla and cream in the nose, following through to a positive attack and a smooth and harmonious mid-palate. Really quite long with a very positive finish. Lovely. ****1/2

Mid garnet. A traditional and quite fragrant nose of orange peel and spice, especially on the top notes. Fresh, silky, good acidity and balance. Mid weight. Fragrant and long. Lovely traditional Rioja. Consistent with a bottle two years ago. **** 1/2

Forced to double decant about four hours ahead of drinking. On first opening this was very densely dark red fruited, rich, quite viscous and showing bright briary fruit. Seemed twenty years younger. Rich and long. ****1/2. On drinking it had lost it's density of rich fruit and some of its poise and had taken on a slitly oxidised, muddy character with nose and palate more in the meaty, robust spectrum. Aged 30 years in four hours. As drunk, ****/92 but scored as it showed when opened.

Dense, dark. Brooding almost. Still an infant, though hugely enjoyable now this would benefit from another decade's slumber. No sign of any tertiary development. Serious dark red to black fruit, a very. Silky texture with a far greater density if fruit than that suggests. A touch of iron and meat, but currently it's about the density and luscious quality if the fruit, bound in by its mineral frame. Long and potentially great. *****

The perfect foil to the 95 Chave alongside. Wild, rustic, sauvage and distinctly agricultural initially, this cleaned up (within reason) and settled down to show classic cornas typicity. The wild child alongside it younger, more cerebral brother. Meaty, a touch of iron that's slightly rusty, long with lovely acidity. Lovely with the pigeon and snipe. Very very good, but by definition not quite the class (or the polish) of the Chave, but then it shouldn't be. One to enjoy rather than take home to meet the parents. ****1/2

Dense and rounded on the nose with a lactic character that blows off after a while (I see I noted the same character on a bottle in autumn 2011). Dense and plush. This has a slightly sensual and fun side to it whilst undoubtably being a serious wine, but there's just a little frisson of something naughty (previously noted as the demure side of sexy). Long, quite rich. A lovely counterpoint to the denser and slightly more serious Montebello. ****1/2

Dark, dense, very polished. Similar on the palate. A deep core of blackcurrant fruit with a mineral and damp earth edge and a touch of briar. This is very plush, dense and serious. Very lovely. More serious and a little less superficially flamboyant than a recent 99, lovely now but with a decade if two ahead of it. A lovely pairing with the slightly looser and less prim Dominus. Hugely impressive. *****

Benefited from a longer decant than the bottle from the same case enjoyed at the same venue two years ago. A lovely sweetness of fruit but with a distinctively minty balancing edge to it. Rounded and long and worryingly easy to drink. Lovely. *****

Two bottles with consistent notes, and consistent with a bottle about six months ago, so I'll be lazy and repeat the note: The drinkable face of PX. Dark caramel rather than near black, light oil rather than the tarry dense viscous stuff that PX usually is. Caramel and toffee with a touch of toasted hazelnut. Sweet but not cloying and very drinkable. Maybe a little inconsequential, but actually all the better for it - a drink rather than an event. ***1/2