TN: 1989 Ch. Meyney

I have found Meyney to be a slow maturing St. Estephe and I usually take my time opening them (this was only the second one out of a case I have).

Medium colour with light edges, a nose of cedar and plum with an overlay of dusty spice cake, good length and a smooth finish with soft tannins still evident. With time in the glass some tobacco and blackberry began to show in the nose.

Had it with a decadent dinner featuring Beef Wellington.

I am quite happy with where this wine is at present and will move it into my current drinking schedule, but I looked at the numerous notes out there on the wine and it is pretty clear that with varying cellar conditions the wine hasn’t developed as well, with reports of senescence and tertiary notes and clearly bad bottles. This spent its life since release in my two cellars, a passive one usually at around 16 C. and my current temperature controlled 13 C. cellar and it points out the importance of temp for long term cellaring.

I intend to try the 1986 Meyney in the near future - I left it alone as based on early tastings it was a typical fairly hard 1986. Hopefully it will also have ‘come around’ I am also holding some 1995 and will have to research the development arc of that vintage as well and maybe pop a cork.

I've probably drunk more Meyney than any other Bordeaux. The 82 was great, as was the 85, though both show their age. The '89 was my fave for a long time, and agree still drinking very nicely (I have 3 left). But in last 5 years ago the 86 has been my favorite- not that the 89 faded, but that the 86 came out of its tannic shell. I've been less enthused over the Meyneys of the 90s (and downright disappointed with 2000 and 2005).

[Jenise]

Bill, well as I know you and the quantity of long-holds you have, I still marvel at your foresight to buy wines like this in quantity and your patience to leave them alone.

Much as I'd like to take credit for patience (partly true) and forbearance, remember that until I built the new cellar, I kept my Bordeaux holdings in wooden cases two deep and around 7 high so trying to locate a given bottle was often challenging.

But I did realize long ago that I much preferred mature bordeaux and that takes patience, as Dale said, so not being in a rush to get into them was advisable. I still have around 40 cases that span from 1964 to 2010, but my claret buying came up short after the 1995/1996 vintages as I got to taste barrel samples here in Vancouver a few years before making buying decisions and the trend in winemaking failed to impress me.- I bought very little after that period except for a few cellar buy-outs of vintage in the first decade of this century, mostly vintages like 2005. There is no substitute for being able to buy en primeur after tasting (except for Sauternes which I always found very, very difficult to assess and predict future development paths for). Thanks to Bill Blatch, I got a very useful preview every year.

Unfortunately, the modern trend in winemaking in Bordeaux leaves me uninterested in what juicy Parkerized high points wines are today, but I doubt that I'll run out of the older vintages any time soon.