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Cos d'Estournel 2017

RegionBordeaux
Subregion France > Bordeaux > Left Bank > St Estèphe
ColourRed
TypeStill
Grape VarietyCabernet Sauvignon/Merlot

Cos is in Saint Estephe but borders Pauillac and, in particular, the vineyards of Chateau Lafite. Quality was good in the 1990's but, since the 2001 vintage, it has reached another level. In some vintages the quality level is not far from that of the first Growths. The stunning new winery is the most modern and sophisticated in all of Bordeaux, with the world's only 100% gravity cellar - no pumps used at all. Cos is now battling it out with Léoville Lascases, Ducru Beaucaillou and Palmer as the Médoc's best non-First Growth.

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Label

Tasting Notes

Tasted blind. Deep ruby colour. Cured meats, black pepper and summer fruits on the nose. Graphite and cassis on the palate, together with more of that meaty oak spice. Fairly rich and ripe for the vintage, with lots of exotic spice character and wood tannin. An attempt to be plush that is fairly successful – it retains the better elements of freshness in the vintage.
Drink 2025 – 2037

17+
Thomas Parker MW, JancisRobinson.com, October 2021

Quite the bottle here! Spices, such as nutmeg and cinnamon, as well as dried meat and plums with cedar and sandalwood. Full body. Deep and dense in the center palate and a long, long finish. Shows finesse and tightness. Very polished tannins. Long and ethereal. Try after 2023.

98
James Suckling, JamesSuckling.com, January 2020

The 2017 Cos d’Estournel has a medium to deep garnet-purple color. It needs a little coaxing to reveal classic notes of cassis, ripe juicy plums, and cedar chest, followed by hints of tar, graphite, and bay leaves, with a waft of truffles. Medium-bodied, the palate is tightly wound with energetic black fruits and mineral layers, supported by grainy tannins and plenty of freshness, finishing with great length.

97+
Lisa Perrotti-Brown MW, The Wine Independent, December 2022

This is exceptional, if a touch below the intensity and harmony of 2016. I love the density that's displayed in this wine, showcasing luxurious, well-enrobed tannins. The complexity steals up on you little by little, the dark cassis and plum fruit character deepening through the palate with flashes of sage, charcoal, cigar box, graphite and taut tannins. The colour difference is marked between the grand vin and second wine, with the Cos extremely deep damson in colour following a one-month maceration at 30 degrees and clever use of the press. Harvested 12- 30 September. 40% of production went into the grand vin. 3.7pH. IPT68. 60% new oak.
Drinking Window 2026 - 2040

94
Jane Anson, Decanter.com, April 2018

Inky with black core and purple rim. Dark-fruited and lightly charry to give a savoury/fruit complexity. Extremely pure cassis. A little more chewy than the Pagodes but still remarkably silky, with clarity, precision and length but without excess richness. Deep and long. Amazing balance already. Great precision, helped by a decade of experience in the new chai, says technical director Dominique Arangoits. Opens in the glass to reveal a hint of something floral. Plenty of depth but no excess weight, and modest alcohol.
Drink 2025-2040

17.5+
Julia Harding MW, JancisRobinson.com, April 2018

The nose is firm the start of the palate tight but it opens up in the middle with a rich mix of black fruits black cherry backed by cassis. The concentrated fruit is supported by fine tannins depth of flavour the fruit at the back rich and ripe. Drink 2025-2041.

91/94
Derek Smedley MW, DerekSmedleyMW.co.uk, May 2018

Tasted with owner Michel Reybier and winemaker Dominique Arangoïts. After a dry winter, the clay soils were not quite fully replenished with water. March saw good weather and an early bud break. There was no frost damage in April, because of their proximity to the Gironde. In June there were some warm conditions – above 30C during the day and even above 20C during the night. The vines started to suffer a little – a month earlier than this might happen in a normal vintage. From the 26 - 30 June 95mm rain fell and the vineyards recovered. July and August was a little cooler
and not too sunny and ripening continued like clockwork. At the end of August, the growing slowed again, with the vegetal growth stopping but the grapes continued to ripen their tannins. Cool weather and some rain came in September and the skins ripened even faster and they started picking on 12th September. The grapes were perfectly ripe and the balance between skin ripeness, acidity and sugar was perfectly ‘Bordelaise’ according to Dominique. He said that the vintage ended up being a strange hybrid of 2003 heat and 2005 / 2010 coolness. The colour alone is incredible in this wine and this is the first signal to its intensity. The ripe skins gave up absolutely everything for this wine. There is trademark exoticism here found in the scent, but it is tempered by control and detail. There is exquisite balance here, too, and the tannins are sensational - mouth-watering but not too astringent. There are dark chocolate and plum notes on the palate and there is serious length here, but nothing is too hurried or over-extracted. There is no trace of oak – it is in perfect balance from all aspects of its make-up. This seems like a new dawn for Cos – it is a terroir vintage and the terroir has spoken.

18.5+
Matthew Jukes, Matthew Jukes' Blog, April 2018
Read more tasting notes...

Composed of 66% Cabernet Sauvignon, 32% Merlot, 1% Petit Verdot and 1% Cabernet Franc, yields for the grand vin in 2017 were 43 hectoliters per hectare, and it was aged in 60% new oak. It came in at an alcohol of 13% and an IPT of 68. Deep garnet-purple colored, the 2017 Cos d'Estournel needs a little coaxing to unfurl, revealing beautiful expressions of preserved plums, boysenberries, blackcurrant pastilles and wild blueberries with hints of Indian spices, menthol, lilacs and mossy tree bark plus a compelling suggestion of iron ore. Medium to full-bodied, the palate has a solid backbone of firm, grainy tannins and well-knit freshness supporting the tightly wound blue and black fruits layers, finishing long and fragrant. This wine will need a good 5-7 years in bottle before it begins to blossom and should go on for at least another 40 years. I expect this wine to be a blockbuster of a head-turner when I come back and taste it at 10 years of age!

98+
Lisa Perrotti-Brown MW, RobertParker.com, March 2020

Love tasting this wine. You almost want to drink it for its harmony and balance. Full-bodied and so complete with cloves, spices, dark berries and hints of chocolate. Wonderful integration on the finish.

97/98
James Suckling, JamesSuckling.com, April 2018

The final blend of the 2017 Cos d'Estournel is 66% Cabernet Sauvignon, 32% Merlot, 1% Petit Verdot and 1% Cabernet Franc. Very deep purple-black in color, it offers up intense scents of crushed blackcurrants, blackberries and black cherries with touches of incense, spice cake, star anise and plum preserves plus a perfumed hint of potpourri. The palate is medium-bodied with very firm yet wonderfully ripe, "sweet", fine-grained tannins at just 13% alcohol—something of a miracle in our modern times. The palate sports fantastic freshness and tons of energy emitted from the intensely perfumed black fruit layers, finishing on an epically long-lingering mineral note. Truly profound.

97/100
Lisa Perrotti-Brown MW, Wine Advocate (236), April 2018
Please note that these tasting notes/scores are not intended to be exhaustive and in some cases they may not be the most recently published figures. However, we always do our best to add latest scores and reviews when these come to our attention. We advise customers who wish to purchase wines based simply on critical reviews to carry out further research into the latest reports.