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Château Léoville-Barton 1994

Prompted by last week’s choice, the 1970 Rieussec, I thought this week I should turn my spotlight onto a bottle more typical of my weekly drinking, which – believe it or not – doesn’t feature 55-year-old birth-year Sauternes as often as you might think.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, my cellar is rich in choices from my two favoured regions, Bordeaux and the Loire Valley. And while my tastes in Bordeaux are fairly catholic, in that I can be happy drinking wines of various colours, styles and oenological philosophies, from both banks, I certainly have my preferences. As a consequence, if you were to unlock the door to my cellar (be aware, this might require first incapacitating me, and then prising the key from my rigid grip), and poke your head inside, you would find the left bank most strongly represented.

Perhaps surprisingly, having checked my cellar records Château Cantemerle comes in first place, reflecting its role as a source of more affordable and classically styled left-bank Bordeaux. I have fond memories of the 1996 vintage; drinking it at a rate of one or two bottles per year, it taught me a lot about how Cabernet-based Bordeaux blends develop under cork. I have bought it again in more recent vintages, including 2000, 2005 and 2010. All perhaps in an attempt to recapture the joy of that last bottle of the 1996.

Thereafter come a slew of left-bank names, with Château Montrose taking second place, surely not surprising given the form this property has shown over the years.

And in third place is Château Léoville-Barton.

Château Léoville-Barton 1994

I don’t have too many bottles of the 1994 vintage remaining in the cellar; indeed, it looks like this is my penultimate bottle, having worked my way through the best part of a dozen. Bought for a song at auction a couple of decades ago (I would tell you the price, but I don’t want to see you weeping this early in our relationship), these bottles have provided a lot of pleasure over the years. Nevertheless, it is a little while since I last pulled the cork on one, and it is about time I revisited this vintage, not just because it has recently hit 30 years of age, but because it is one of several vintages which popped into my head when I was in Bordeaux tasting the 2024 barrel samples only a month of so ago.

The 1994 vintage is not remembered as one of prodigious quality, although as I am sure Bordeaux drinkers with long memories will recall it was a significant step up from what 1991, 1992 and arguably 1993 offered (I remember, back in the mid-1990s, receiving a bottle of the 1992 vintage from a well-known classed growth as a gift; that was an instructive bottle, although it taught a different lesson to the one the 1996 Cantemerle offered).

The season in fact started out well, with an early budbreak and decent flowering, with warm summer weather encouraging a rapid ripening and pushing the potential alcohols northwards. Everything was looking rosy, and it looked like the Bordelais might have another 1990 or 1982 on their hands, a blessed relief after the frost of 1991 and dismal results in 1992. Such hopes were dashed when the heavens opened in early September. There was persistent rain throughout the harvest period, prompting some to pick early before full maturity had been achieved, while those that delayed saw better ripeness but this came with dilution, consequent upon all that rain. The best anyone could say at the end of it all was that 1994 was better than 1991, 1992 and 1993.

I think that’s known as “damning a vintage with faint praise.”

Happily, some châteaux have a habit of turning out delightfully drinkable and attractively ageworthy wines even in less benevolent vintages. Lily Barton-Sartorius appears to have done just this at Léoville-Barton very recently, in 2024, producing one of the better wines of the left bank. Her father, the late Anthony Barton (1930 – 2022), seemingly did much the same in 1994. He had joined his uncle on the property in 1951, at a time when a run of poor vintages prompted the elder Ronald Barton (1902 – 1986) to consider selling up. This early exposure to the reality of the winemaking business, not to mention having worked 40 subsequent vintages, must have been invaluable experience for Anthony when it came to weathering the rather dire vintages of the early-1990s.

Proof that, in the most challenging vintages such as 1994, and 2024, talent and terroir come to the fore.

So how does the wine look now, after nearly three decades under cork? The 1994 vintage from Château Léoville-Barton still displays a great colour, even at over thirty years of age, with a dark core, and while the rim is fading and wide, it still has a remarkably fresh hue. After a couple of hours in the decanter it reveals a rather cool-vintage character on the nose, with notes of desiccated redcurrant nuanced with green peppercorn, sage and mint; these herby elements have long been a strong feature of this vintage. The palate has a charming substance, medium-bodied with bright and rather perfumed fruit which build on the nose, with violets and currants set against a fading backdrop of peppery and powdery tannins which polish away the end of the palate. It holds together rather well, with a sinewy and acid-fresh style, developing notes of dark and savoury black fruit substance, with salted berries and dried black olives, before a long and powdery finish. All in all this is a classic left bank claret, with energy, tannic drive and fresh acidity; while drinking well now, this still has a good future ahead of it yet. The alcohol on the label is 12.5%. 93/100 (2/6/25)

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