WTN - Dinner featuring 3 vintages of Pontet-Canet

Having acquired a few wines from Pontet-Canet, a couple weeks ago I got together with some dear friends, made Julia's Child's Boeuf Bourgignon, and had the best little wine dinner I've ever been part of. Great company, great wines, great food - the best way to enjoy all three! With this evening, I acquired two unusual distinctions in my wine tasting experience: (1) 1970 is now the red Bordeaux vintage prior to 2000 for which I have tasted the most wines, and (2) Pontet-Canet is now the single Bordeaux chateau I have tasted the most wines from. In truth, this is a product of the fact that I am still young and not extensively experienced, so what we're seeing here is "small number statistics." But I digress - this dinner was quite the treat.

Domaine Barons de Rothschild, Reserve Speciale (Blanc), Bordeaux 2007
Lemon, creamy pear, green apple, floral notes. Generous lemon-tart acidity. Pleasant, solid little white Bordeaux. Very Good (85 - 87). [7/9/10]

Chateau Pontet-Canet, Pauillac 1970
Base neck fill. Medium-dark garnet; good color! Very nice old Bordeaux nose, savory, and with glycerin showing. A succulent palate, with cherry/raspberry, cassis, and a bit of tar. Medium-full bodied. Opens and grows very nicely in the glass. Still has good fruit, with nice tone and structure; one can sense the intense 1970 structure this would once have had. Near the end of its very mature prime, but can probably hold at this level for a few more years; this wine is in great shape for its age. Quite a treat, and a consummate match to Julia Child's Boeuf Bourgignon! Excellent (87 - 90). [7/9/10]

Les Hauts de Pontet-Canet, Pauillac 2000
Medium dark ruby. Nose a bit funky and not much on the palate at first, but with time in the glass, it opens beautifully. Cherry/raspberry, cassis, tar/dark fruit, lots of mineral, hints of herbs, and hints of pencil lead. Succulent. Compared to the 1970 Pontet-Canet grand vin tasted just before, this drinks like a much younger version of the same wine, and seems to confirm the similarity between the two vintages (how nice to get to compare the two). In addition, nearly equal in quality to the 2002 Pontet-Canet grand vin tasted just after. Approachable now with air, but better in 3 - 5 years, and should drink nicely until 2020 or so. 2000 shows its depth here! Excellent / Exceptional (89 - 91). [7/9/10]

Chateau Pontet-Canet, Pauillac 2002
Decanted 2 1/2 hours, and needed further time in the glass to open (nose a bit funky at first). Opaque ruby. Excellent, dense, rich nose. Cherry, blackberry, cassis, tarry/leathery notes, a hint of roasted herb/tobacco, and a hint of pencil lead/mineral. Full bodied, ripe, and dense, with good tone. Needs time, perhaps another 5 years, and shouldlast last until 2020 - 2025. Quite an impressive performance from this maligned vintage, and for under $40, a very impressive value as well. Exceptional (90 - 93). [7/9/10]

Presidential, 30 Year Old (Tawny), Porto NV
Caramel color. Red berry notes, caramel, hints of chocolate, orange rind, and suggestions of apple. Very smooth, and delightfully easy to drink. Drink now. Exceptional (90 - 93). [7/9/10]

I am still young and not extensively experienced...

For someone so young and inexperienced you are relatively precise with your projected drinking windows and scores

87.56% of young, inexperienced wine drinkers are more inaccurate in their precise estimates than 21.53% of old drunkards.

John the old drunkard

I am still young and not extensively experienced...

For someone so young and inexperienced you are relatively precise with your projected drinking windows and scores

What can I say, I'm a scientist, I love numbers, and unrealistic precision! Seriously though, I have wondered how I picked up the talent to give scores and projected drinking windows that are usually in very good agreement with professional critics. But then, at this point, those numbers are really for me - my palate, and my maturity preferences, which I do understand extremely well - better than anyone else, I'd argue.

I didn't realize professional critics consistently agreed on drinking windows. I thought it was one of those standard parlor games to debate and argue about all the variation in predictions. But maybe you've linked yourself with your favorite/most relevant critics. Which is more important afterall.

Perhaps these drinking windows are more important for things like Bordeaux where the wines follow predictable paths? (I'm not sure if that's the case. Maybe they do, maybe they don't. I don't drink much Bordeaux). In Burgundy, it seems like the only useful drinking window is whether you would open another bottle tomorrow or not. Because they go in and out of drinkability so many times over the course of a year that it defies careful prediction..

[David M. Bueker]

The only thing we know for sure is that the wine will always have the last word.

Nice notes Ryan. Don't let these guys get to you. Pontet-Canet is one of the few classified Bordeaux wines in my collection (Talbot is another) so it is nice to hear they are giving pleasure.

I didn't realize professional critics consistently agreed on drinking windows. I thought it was one of those standard parlor games to debate and argue about all the variation in predictions. But maybe you've linked yourself with your favorite/most relevant critics. Which is more important afterall.

Niether did I. Really, I think what we should be surprised by is that the critics agree at all, which they usual do "within the errors," at least on Bordeaux. Perhaps I should have been more precise with my language as well - I tend to agree very well with the critics I tend to agree with. But, in some cases I do feel like they can be conservative on drinking windows, although that depends on what you consider to be "mature" versus "past it," and I do continue to enjoy quality Bordeaux at least until its just plain dead (then again, what I consider dead is probably different too). Well, here's the final word: I've polled myself, and all of me agrees with me.

Perhaps these drinking windows are more important for things like Bordeaux where the wines follow predictable paths? (I'm not sure if that's the case. Maybe they do, maybe they don't. I don't drink much Bordeaux). In Burgundy, it seems like the only useful drinking window is whether you would open another bottle tomorrow or not. Because they go in and out of drinkability so many times over the course of a year that it defies careful prediction..

I think you've got it right re Bordeaux - most Bordeaux follows a pretty well defined arc, but the timescale of that arc is different for different wines. Lately, I've started to realize that my suggested drinking windows actually reflect Coats Law of Maturity pretty well, and I've started to factor that in a bit. Although I don't drink as much Burgundy as I'd like to, I find my suggested drinking windows tend to agree with Wine Spectator quite well. However, I'm not really "calibrated for Burgundy;" the oldest red Burg I've had was 54 years old, and the next oldest was 9 years old, so I've got very little to "define the relationship" with, so I could end up discovering that they don't take on maturity the way I guess they might. Bordeaux on the other hand, I've had wines that sample the age range up to 45 years from vintages of widely varying quality, so I feel like I understand them reasonably well.

Now I just need to wait 20 - 30 years to see if I got them right . . . . because David has it right of course!

I'm also a bit of a fan of P-C, having come to their wine starting with the 96. It use to be one of my value buy but with their success in recent years, their purchase is no longer automatic.

It is interesting that you see the 2000 in the same light at the 1970, which I've never tasted. The winery back in 1970 was still owned by the Cruse family then sold to the current owners (the Tesserons from Cognac) in the late 70's. The 2000 had one further change, Michel Rolland started with the winery in the late 90's so his impact would definitely be seen in the 2000's. It's nice to know that sooner or later, the land comes through.