Dame de Montrose 2010

One of the best second wines, and possibly the best since the 1990 is the 2010 La Dame de Montrose. This represents 36% of the production and is a blend of two grapes - 64% Cabernet Sauvignon and 36% Merlot. A superb second wine, opulent and substantively textured, it shares more in common with a flamboyant, exuberant year such as 2009 than most 2010s. Dense purple, its oodles of fruit, luxurious mouthfeel and terrific finish make it a sleeper of the vintage. It's a wine to buy in abundant quantities and drink over the next 10-15+ years.

Tasted blind at the Southwold Bordeaux 2010 tasting. The La Dame de Montrose 2010 has a very well defined bouquet with beautifully assimilated oak: perfumed scents of blackcurrant, blueberry and pastilles. The palate is medium-bodied with a crisp entry: firm and quite rigid tannins, fine acidity and a bullish structure on the finish to suggest that this needs long-term cellaring. This surpasses all my expectations. Tasted January 2014.

You want a good value St Estèphe from a top name, ready to drink this Christmas, this is where to go - one of the best 2nd wines of the vintage. Tasted out of magnum, which made it more primary in its fruit structure than you will find in bottle, but either way this is still full of plump and opulent black cherry and cassis fruits. Still plenty of grip and life ahead, but so much pleasure to be found, and it's at its peak.

64% Cabernet Sauvignon, 36% Merlot, 36% of total production. Very deep crimson. Lovely scented top note and then sumptuously round texture. Fresh and lively with good muscles. Excellent balance and really very flattering without being overripe or sweet. It finishes dry and minerally. Fine skinned. Really a very fine wine indeed - well done! Provided you don't mind a lack of flesh in the middle... 13.7%

*Full article link below, which explains the unusual score.

“It’s gorgeous. I’m enraptured by it. Magnificent scents of chocolate, leather, plums and currants, with the oak a whispered perfume. Tapered power on the palate; a shapely silhouette. But it just gets better; the wonderful Médocain austerity and sobriety grows as the beguiling front palate fades. The quality of the tannins is astonishing: so fine yet so firm. It already has a bucketload of gratifying sediment. Balance, richness, poise, vivacity, concentration: all perfectly judged. Of course I’m drinking it too soon, but too bad. I find it hard not to exclaim after each sip. Not many wines make me do this.”

Andrew Jefford, Decanter Online.

http://www.decanter.com/wine-news/opinion/jefford-on-monday/jefford-on-monday-the-104-point-second-wine-15523/

Rich smoky cassis fruit, good middle sweetness and lift, less depth than expected. Drink 2015-20.