Fifteen Years On: The 2003 Vintage
After yesterday’s report on the wines of the 2003 vintage in the Loire Valley, now all fifteen years old, I thought I should probably move on to look at some other wines of the same age.
This is a real lucky dip of wines. Some, coming from Bordeaux, represent the other region on which I focus, when my mind is not thoroughly occupied by the Loire Valley that is. Others come from regions in which I once had a strong interest, such as the Rhône Valley, but on which I no longer focus. It simply isn’t possible to cover every region in the depth I consider necessary (which is why I decided to restrict myself just two). I still, from time to time, dig out old bottles from the cellar though, and that is what this brief report represents. It is not meant to be comprehensive, or even particularly instructive, it is merely a few new tasting notes on a few old favourites brought up from a dim and dingy corner of the cellar.
There are a few wines here from Burgundy, and while I enjoyed revisiting those from Denis Bachelet and Domaine Chandon de Briailles, it was the two grand cru wines from François Lamarche that really impressed. Sometimes I wish I could write more about Burgundy, but I feel that to know any region well you must immerse yourself in it, as I have tried to do with the Loire Valley and Bordeaux. And with its multifaceted patchwork quilt of grands crus and premiers crus, and its thousands of different vignerons who among them share just twelve different surnames (an exaggeration I know, but you get the idea I hope), this is as true of Burgundy as much as anywhere else.
The wines from Bordeaux were more familiar, and surprisingly good, both those from St Julien and St Emilion showing their mettle. Having said that, being low-acid styles, pouring the wines at home meant that I could reduce the serving temperature to a level which would engender a greater freshness, helping to bring out what little acidity the wines possess, and I suggest you do the same if you are pulling the cork on this vintage any time soon. Beyond this region, the wines from Châteauneuf du Pape and Bandol showed the heat of the vintage a little, as indeed did the sweet wines of Bordeaux, which are delicious but a little lacking in balance, Again, ensuring the wines hit the palate at the right temperature really helped. The lone wine from Jurançon, however, was superb, and it was brimming with fresh acidity. Perhaps this is the result of an extremely late harvest, the fruit finally plucked from the vine in December? A super-long period of dehydration on the vine would perhaps have helped to raise the acidity levels.
On the whole, this is a vintage which has given us broad, rich and seductively textured wines, sometimes a little soft in terms of structure, but rarely short on character. Acid addicts should avoid them, but those of us with a few bottles in the cellar should be tucking in now. The wines seem to be holding up, for the moment, but with rather feeble acidities I am sure this situation cannot continue indefinitely. (19/12/18)
