Bordeaux EP 2023

Nigel Lierop said:
Matthew - thanks for your thoughts on this. Any particular things you'd be buying with an eye to 18th birthdays onwards..?
Click to expand...
Hey buddy,

My headline favourites are Lafleur and Margaux followed by Pichon Lalande and La Conseillante. Doubt you can go wrong with those, other than paying for them! Next up it's more of the usual suspects...Montrose, VCC, Figeac, etc. Le Pin is a stunner but I suspect that's not really the question.

When I'm buying for myself / my 3yo, I'm thinking of: GPL, Brane Cantenac, Les Perrieres (Lafleur), Gloria, Hosanna, maybe Clerc Milon. Hope that's a bit more helpful than the lottery-winners list!
 
From Antonio Galloni's tasting note for a Saint-Emilion grand cru classé offered today:
This iteration includes parcels from the neighboring châteaux, where there is a bit more clay.
Click to expand...
Presumably he means that the 2023 includes grapes from plots recently purchased by (and incorporated into) the property, but for a moment I thought there was some localised Hermitaging afoot...
 
Matthew Hemming said:
Hey buddy,

My headline favourites are Lafleur and Margaux followed by Pichon Lalande and La Conseillante. Doubt you can go wrong with those, other than paying for them! Next up it's more of the usual suspects...Montrose, VCC, Figeac, etc. Le Pin is a stunner but I suspect that's not really the question.

When I'm buying for myself / my 3yo, I'm thinking of: GPL, Brane Cantenac, Les Perrieres (Lafleur), Gloria, Hosanna, maybe Clerc Milon. Hope that's a bit more helpful than the lottery-winners list!
Click to expand...
Thanks- much appreciated. Yes unfortunately the lottery win list not an option!
 
For the first time in this campaign I am tempted. Pichon Lalande is an estate at the top of its game, and in 2023 a contender for wine of the vintage…the 2023 is a significant discount to the 2018/19/20 vintages. I bought halves of 19 and 20 and might buy halves of the 23.

Pichon Comtesse at £1320/12 ib is notably cheaper than other super seconds - LLC @ £1662, Ducru Beaucaillou £1488 and Cos D’Estournel £1440, and came in at the very bottom of the Farr Vintners estimate of £1300-1850.
 
Last edited:
Ian Hampsted said:
For the first time in this campaign I am tempted. Pichon Lalande is an estate at the top of its game, and in 2023 a contender for wine of the vintage…the 2023 is a significant discount to the 2018/19/20 vintages. I bought halves of 19 and 20 and might buy halves of the 23.

Pichon Comtesse at £1320/12 ib is notably cheaper than other super seconds - LLC @ £1662, Ducru Beaucaillou £1488 and Cos D’Estournel £1440, and came in at the very bottom of the Farr Vintners estimate of £1300-1850.
Click to expand...
I’m tempted by P-L, but I’m trying to tell myself that it’s unlikely that it will be in its pomp in my lifetime.
 
Edward Bolland said:
I’m tempted by P-L, but I’m trying to tell myself that it’s unlikely that it will be in its pomp in my lifetime.
Click to expand...
I think we are at a fascinating point where the winemaking / tannin management is becoming so sophisticated that these wines can be enjoyed much younger... the fascinating question is whether they will age as well as older classic years have, or will there be a misstep along the lines of white Burgundy 1995 - 201x. My gut feeling is that the wines are just better at every level and will pull off the magic trick of being more accessible in their youth and still good for decades of evolution. Value of course is a whole other question

I have ordered PLL in halves
 
I have a lot of sympathy for that view Joel, and I think we are going through a golden era for Bordeaux, which I have been arguing on these pages for quite a while, and which William Kelley has more recently articulated. However, the improvement in winemaking productivity and tannin management is more evolutionary and incremental than discrete in nature, which is why a weighted average of recent vintages is an appropriate benchmark for evaluating vfm in this vintage, adjusted for considerations of increased opportunity cost in a higher rates environment. The claim that these wines will never close down and be much more accessible earlier than older vintages, as claimed by one of the merchants, may well turn out to be correct but right now is a matter of conjecture not of fact.
 
Ian, whilst the wines are unquestionably more approachable (my palate has only recently recovered from tasting the 2010s from barrel), I am not convinced that some wines no longer shut down for a period. I'd just penning a raft of 2020 notes and I felt that some had gone into their shell since bottling. As Joel wrote, at the moment I feel that they have longevity. I suppose the question is whether they can motor along for decades like the 1914 Siran or the 1924 Cos d'Estournel tasted in April. I guess none of us will be around to find out.
PS That PLL price is very tempting!
 
This was the claim by the merchant who shall remain nameless:

The magic of vintages like 2023 is that, qualitatively, you may not be buying a 2022, 2016, 2010, ’05 or 1996, but you are getting something that you will happily be able to drink in five years, perhaps then if you’re lucky enough to be able to afford the best names.

The best piece of advice I can impart about the 2023 vintage, is that it is a drinkers' vintage. Even more so, with a lot of the 30-40% discounts we are seeing, it is a drinkers’ vintage at drinking prices. Even if you are the sort of person who only wants the best, these wines belong in your cellar because they are as close as you can get to the epics, but you will actually be able to enjoy them in your lifetime.

I can guarantee, having tasting hundreds of them, that in a decade’s time, it’s a vintage that everyone will want to drink.

My point was that his claim that he can *guarantee* they will be drinking very well in ten years is a matter of conjecture, not of fact.

Your recent experience with the 2020s Neal illustrates that such claims need to be treated with caution and some scepticism.
 
NEAL MARTIN said:
Ian, whilst the wines are unquestionably more approachable (my palate has only recently recovered from tasting the 2010s from barrel), I am not convinced that some wines no longer shut down for a period. I'd just penning a raft of 2020 notes and I felt that some had gone into their shell since bottling. As Joel wrote, at the moment I feel that they have longevity. I suppose the question is whether they can motor along for decades like the 1914 Siran or the 1924 Cos d'Estournel tasted in April. I guess none of us will be around to find out.
PS That PLL price is very tempting!
Click to expand...
Neal… why the hell did you give a potential 100 points to L’eglise Clinet… now I’m tempted despite the price! ;-)
 
I decided not to buy any Pichon Comtesse 2023, even though it is perhaps the only somewhat attractively priced wine in this campaign. I may regret not latching on to 12 halves now, but probably not as I own the 2016, 2019 and 2020 vintages (in the same format in 2020), and I will probably be able to latch on to a three pack of bottles of the 2023 at around the same price in a couple of years from now.

Meanwhile back to business as usual today with the release of Baron, Pavie and Giscours at prices that make zero sense from a buying perspective. I notice that 2023 Giscours was released at £246/6 today, which, iirc, is identical to the 2020 release price. The 2020 is the best vintage of Giscours I have ever tasted including the legends from the 1970s. I looked on line and one merchant had a case of 24 halves of the 2020 at £450ib. I couldn’t say no, so I have ended up with 24 half bottles of Giscours 2020 rather than 12 half bottles of Pichon Lalande 2023, saving £230.
 
Ian Hampsted said:
I decided not to buy any Pichon Comtesse 2023, even though it is perhaps the only somewhat attractively priced wine in this campaign. I may regret not latching on to 12 halves now, but probably not as I own the 2016, 2019 and 2020 vintages (in the same format in 2020), and I will probably be able to latch on to a three pack of bottles of the 2023 at around the same price in a couple of years from now.

Meanwhile back to business as usual today with the release of Baron, Pavie and Giscours at prices that make zero sense from a buying perspective. I notice that 2023 Giscours was released at £246/6 today, which, iirc, is identical to the 2020 release price. The 2020 is the best vintage of Giscours I have ever tasted including the legends from the 1970s. I looked on line and one merchant had a case of 24 halves of the 2020 at £450ib. I couldn’t say no, so I have ended up with 24 half bottles of Giscours 2020 rather than 12 half bottles of Pichon Lalande 2023, saving £230.
Click to expand...
It looks like Pavie has done an Angelus ! What a surprise

Mind you l’Eglise Clinet looks tempting
 
Ian Hampsted said:
I decided not to buy any Pichon Comtesse 2023, even though it is perhaps the only somewhat attractively priced wine in this campaign. I may regret not latching on to 12 halves now, but probably not as I own the 2016, 2019 and 2020 vintages (in the same format in 2020), and I will probably be able to latch on to a three pack of bottles of the 2023 at around the same price in a couple of years from now.

Meanwhile back to business as usual today with the release of Baron, Pavie and Giscours at prices that make zero sense from a buying perspective. I notice that 2023 Giscours was released at £246/6 today, which, iirc, is identical to the 2020 release price. The 2020 is the best vintage of Giscours I have ever tasted including the legends from the 1970s. I looked on line and one merchant had a case of 24 halves of the 2020 at £450ib. I couldn’t say no, so I have ended up with 24 half bottles of Giscours 2020 rather than 12 half bottles of Pichon Lalande 2023, saving £230.
Click to expand...
Ah, the old “But look how much I’ve saved” argument, as used by my wife when she’s bought yet another pair of shoes that she doesn’t need in a sale. :)
 
Yeah I know what you mean Colin - saving by spending is a spurious and perverse notion - it was the fact that I could get them in halves which tipped me over the edge, because it was on my hit list, my marginal 2020 purchase.

Stephen and Ed - you can buy the 2016 and 2020 L’Eglise Clinet for less than the 2023 (2009 release prices were a crazy local peak and 2019 has a premium as Durantou’s last vintage), so if I was buying this wine I would opt for the 2016.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top