People ask me what kind of wine do you want to make at Pichon? This is it. Every day, we could see the shape of the berries changing in the run-up to harvest, shrinking, and we wanted to make something pure with freshness. So, what kind of wine were we going to make? We wanted everything to ripen perfectly. It was warm and dry-such contrast was very unusual. Six months of almost daily rain! So, there came a point when you had to ask, what kind of wine can we make in 2018? Then from mid-July it abruptly switched. “I just don’t know where it came from,” Pichon Lalande’s Technical Director, Nicolas Glumineau, told me. Full-bodied, concentrated and completely laden with tightly wound black fruit and savory layers, the palate gives a rock-solid backbone of firm, super ripe, super fine-grained tannins and soft background freshness, finishing very long with a veritable display of mineral fireworks. This is largely due to the energy, drive and ambition of May-Eliane de Lenquesaing, who took over the property in 1978. Very deep purple-black colored, it is like hitting a brick wall to begin, needing considerable coaxing to start to reveal notes of crushed black cherries, warm blackberries, ripe blackcurrants and chocolate cake with nuances of violets, rose hip tea, charcuterie, tapenade and incense with wafts of new leather and iron ore. Chteau Pichon-Longueville Lalande is one of the most important Super Seconds and this 2me Cru Class Pauillac estate has made tremendous strides in the last 20 years. ![]() The 2018 Pichon Longueville Comtesse de Lalande is made up of 71% Cabernet Sauvignon, 23% Merlot, 5% Cabernet Franc and 1% Petit Verdot with a pH of 3.85, an IPT (total polyphenol index) of 87 and 14% alcohol. The grand vin represents 50% of the crop this year. Wine Advocate – Lisa Perrotti-Brown (9 7 – 9 9 ).Full-bodied, tight and integrated with a refreshing and harmonious finish. 3.75pH, 88IPT – higher even than the 80IPT in 2016.Ī deep and intense young red with blackberries and blueberries, as well as green olives and hints of fresh tobacco. I’ve tasted this several times with each conveying a juiciness and elegance that is quite different in style to many in Pauillac this year – it’s a 98-100 for me, and I’m already looking forward to re-tasting it in bottle.ġ% Petit Verdot completes the blend. Rich raspberries combine with peonies and curls of woodsmoke while the appellation’s signature slate, cedar, liquorice and tannic grip slowly builds up on the palate. The nose on this stands out a mile, getting it right up on the podium before you even take a sip. This has to be up there with one of the most seductive Comtesses on record with layers of alternating softness and concentration combined with a lot of 2016’s elegance and power. One of the high water marks of the vintage. This one nails it in 2018, with saturated, almost sappy kirsch, plum and blackberry preserve flavors at the core, inlaid with sweet tobacco, singed vanilla, worn cedar and fresh earth notes. Wine Spectator – James Molesworth (9 7 – 100 ).A very beautiful persistence on notes of toasted almond, hazelnut and mocha.Pichon Longueville Comtesse de Lalande 2018 – Duxieme Grand Cru Classé A racy, beautifully powerful, rich but bull of delicacy and precision wine. ![]() ![]() On the palate this wine expresses notes of pulpy/fleshy wild cassis, small black berries and small notes of wild raspberry associated with touches of tonka bean/mocha, incense, black tea, black plum, a racy minerality as well as fine hints of caramelized oak, saffron, bergamot, discreet hints of bourbon vanilla pod, toasted hazelnut and an imperceptible hint of coffee (in the background). The palate is elegant, delicate, gourmand, very discreetly tight and offers precision, a beautiful definition, a certain richness, fullness, suavity as well as a beautiful balanced, a certain density, a fine tension, energy and deepness. It reveals notes of crushed blackberry, pulpy cassis and small notes of pulpy strawberry associated with touches of vanilla, incense, pepper, crushed raspberry as well as fine hints of caramelization, toasted hazelnut, discreet hints of vanilla bourbon, an imperceptible hint of verbena and iodine gravels. ![]() The nose is beautifully elegant, bright, beautifully intense, harmonious and offers complexity as well as a beautiful finesse of the grain and a multi-layer side which imposes to come back regularly on the nose to see its evolution.
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