1973 Château Mouton Rothschild

Community Tasting Note

J @ y H @ c k Likes this wine:

92 Points

Sunday, August 6, 2023 - First, the storage: Purchased on release at Zachy's in approximately 1976. Two years in an unairconditioned apartment that recent law school graduates live in while earning $16,500 a year. Then eight years in a rack in the basement with a very leaky door to the outside at your first house that you could afford only because your father loaned you the money for the down payment, then 27 years in a passive underground cellar of your second house until your wife insists that you have to build a real cellar in the basement because she is tired of having to move cases around on the floor just to find the wine that you want, then 10 years in a temperature-controlled cellar built by Chris Kravitz.

Fill: Low Shoulder.

Cork: The first cork I have had that did not come out cleanly with a Durand. The top 80% of the cork came out in a crumble and looked like that dark brown crumbled chocolate you sometimes get on a cake. Half the rest made it out of the bottle with careful use of the Durand worm and the rest did a swan dive with a twist into the wine.

Decant: The wine has been lying at a slight angle in the display row in the cellar for a decade without moving, label up. Brought upstairs, put in an angled wine carrier at the same angle, cork removed, decanted through a fine screen to catch the crumbled cork into a "decanter" I got at K-Mart for $4.50, and then poured immediately into the glasses of waiting guests in the back yard.

Color: OMG - other notes say it was light in color. Not this bottle. As I decanted it, I noticed a slight browning in the stream, but in the bottle it was dark Bordeaux colored with no sign of bricking. The color was indistinguishable from the other four red wines we served - all at least 35 years younger.

Palate: Excellent. No sign of significant deterioration or other bad things that happen when Bordeaux gets old and tired. I would never had guessed 50 years old. I would have been surprised at 1982 and more likely would have guessed 1989 or 1990. Extremely smooth. Although the tannin was probably 95% resolved, there was still just a bit. There was red fruit on the nose but it was subdued on the palate. When I consider that my collection, and hence what I like to drink, leans heavily towards SQN, Saxum, and the cabs of Thomas Rivers Brown, subdued is probably a compliment to most of you. I have had some great Bordeaux over the years. 1989 Haut Brion, 1989 and 1990 Montrose, 2000 Latour and 1928 Margaux (at age 41) come to mind, and this was excellent. If it had more fruit or a bit more power, I would probably have scored it about 95. If I factor in the age, the storage, and the fill, this would get a 97.

Original cost - no sure, but definitely less that $10.