2005 Château La Tour de Bessan

Community Tasting Notes (5) Avg Score: 89.6 points

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  8/25/2013 - flwinos wrote: 90 Points

  Decanted for about an hour before starting to drink. Tannins still present after the one hour, but paired with grilled NY Strip and the fat from the steak paired well with it. After the second hour, this was much better integrated. As others have noted, cherry fruit with a lot of scorched earth. Overall for $26, to me this was a pretty good Bordeaux.

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  10/29/2011 - 3daywinereview.com wrote: 85 Points

  Hennepin Lake's Annual Tasting (Tons of Napa Cabs) (Minneapolis, MN): Dust, cherry and earth. A light Bordeaux for such a great vintage. Short to medium finish.

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  10/16/2011 - BailliSacks Likes this wine: 90 Points

  Very very nice affordable Bdx.

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  2/25/2011 - dxpian wrote: 90 Points

  Boy, what an interesting wine! Certainly under-reviewed I would say, but the wine has its own merits that make you really like it. I typically do NOT like wines with a lot of make-up on, but this is definitely my first! Well, anyway, let's get right into it: dark ruby/purple color with slight garnet hue, color pigments slowly streaming down the glass. Predominantly meaty nose hosting a bouquet of filet mignon and black pepper, eventually leading into some nice blackberry, cherry and blueberry aromas with LOTS of oak and dark-roasted coffee gradually fading away... Chewing into bitter tannin, this full-bodied wine screams with oak-monster! But after spitting out the splinters, fruit finally opens up showing some cherry, plum and blackberry components, although slightly disjointed at first, but eventually comes together with a little air time. Solid structure of firm tannins and dancing acidity, transitioning into a well-rounded mid-palate and a medium finish. On the finish, as you can imagine, tannin shadows other nuances for quite a while, a lot of it on the back-end, suggesting oak-effect, then evolving to a short blossom of fruit, vanilla and cedar (wood again).
  
  Obviously the Château tries really hard, a little too hard in my opinion, but its natural beauty starts to unmask once you bypass the layer of its make-up. Could have been a much-higher scored wine from me if the oak-monster doesn't scream as loud, and it should really be positioned at 89 PLUS. But overall, it is a solid effort from the producer, does show the intrinsic characteristics of a Margaux. Even though there's too much make-up on, but hey, people still like Lady Gaga, and this wine really has that Lady Gaga effect, which claws its way back up to the 90-point mark from me. Needs a load of time in the cellar to mellow, give it till 2013 and drink before 2025. Decanting strongly recommended.

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  3/1/2009 - GETRENNT wrote: 91 Points

  N: Medium + intens, Bright raspberry, fresh gummy bears, shredded pine needles, lemon juice, mulberry jam.
  P: M acid, M+ drying tannin, Hi- body, M+ fin
  Oily black leather, wet gamey hide, chocolate, stewed plums
  Needs alot of time to integrate, impressive

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