Château de Malle: Tasting & Drinking
By all accounts the wines of Château de Malle have shown marked improvements under the tenure of Nancy de Bournazel, who took the reins following the death of her husband in 1985. Writing in The Wines of Bordeaux (University of California Press, 2004) Clive Coates yells us that up until the mid-1980s the wines were “uninspiring at best” before describing a remarkable renaissance, declaring the more recent vintages sufficiently good to secure a position for the estate as “one of the best of the second growths“. This seemed to mirror the opinion of Stephen Brook writing in Sauternes (Faber and Faber, 1995), who also describes a revival beginning in the late-1980s.
My own experience with the wines of Château de Malle concerns more recent and rather more relevant vintages, and these include the latest triumvirate of great Sauternes vintages, 2009, 2010 and 2011. These wines are certainly very good, although my personal opinion is that in terms of quality they certainly do not match that found at Château Doisy-Daëne or Château Doisy-Védrines, although admittedly my feeling is that these two Barsac estates are punching above their weight, frequently challenging the premiers crus in terms of delicious desirability, so perhaps this comparison is unfair. Nevertheless, these wines are also outclassed by those of Château Nairac (even if this property did stumble in the early 21st century, the management of the vineyard eventually turned over to Grands Chais de France). Pit them against their other second growth peers, however, estates such as Château Filhot, Château d’Arche, Château Lamothe and Château Lamothe-Guignard for example, and these wines suddenly look very much more appealing.
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