Château Lagrange Vertical, 2016: Dinner
Having tasted the 2015 vintage with Matthieu Bordes and Keiichi Shiina I headed inside for a vertical tasting. This was accompanied by a dinner, starting with hors d’oeuvres of oysters and foie gras followed by lobster with scallop and samphire, lamb from the Pyrenees with Tandoori spices and spring vegetable tian, cheeses and a strawberry mille feuille. Along with these I tasted (and drank!) the 2015 Les Arums de Lagrange, just one week after bottling, followed by nine vintages of Château Lagrange.
I shall resist the temptation to run through the vintages one by one here, as all my tasting notes are presented below. Suffice to say that despite all the work undertaken by Matthieu Bordes and his team in very recent years the 2005 vintage was still my favourite from this line up, just nudging the 2010 into second place. On the whole the wines showed well with the 2007 vintage drinking nicely and showing an impressive character, in that it clearly had some vigour to it, and certainly doesn’t need drinking up. The 2008 vintage also surprised, and tasted much better than I would have thought from earlier tastes, quite a few years ago now. Both the 2000 and the 1996 were delightfully drinkable, while 1989 and 1985 were showing their respective ages, albeit with a very charming, old-school style to them. I for one would be very happy to drink these older vintages – if the 2000 and 1996 weren’t available, that is.
My dinner done I headed to bed, thankful that the rain had finally eased off. I left early the next morning, in the pitch dark, a good hour before before dawn (and before breakfast was served, sadly) in order to get around the Rocade in time for my 8am appointment at Château Haut-Brion. More first encounters with Bordeaux 2015 awaited….. (6/9/16)
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