Shop Wine

wines

A joyous Lascombes, this is the first vintage to hit stride since the US investment firm Colony Capital took over in 2001. It’s a meaty wine draped in fragrant tannin, built for long aging. It’s also an exuberant wine, in both the bright, red currant-scented fruit and the bristle of the tannin. A playfully complex flavor lasts for minutes, the wine still youthful and fresh four days after it was opened. Margaux chic.Wine & Spirits | 94 W&SDark in color, with an impressive nose of licorice, toasty oak, chocolate and blackberry. Full-bodied, with silky tannins and a long, caressing finish. Very pretty and structured. Best after 2012. 25,000 cases made.Wine Spectator | 93 WS(52% cabernet sauvignon, 45% merlot and 3% petit verdot) Good bright ruby. Blueberry and licorice on the nose, lifted by spicy oak. Chewy, lush and dense, but with a sappy quality giving shape to the fruit. Very tactile, solid wine with a saline quality suggesting energetic extraction. But this offers impressive mouth coverage and finishes broad and long, with nicely restrained sweetness. Wait until 2011.Vinous Media | 89-92 VMLascombes is approaching the form its status as a second growth suggests. This wine is close, packed with dark fruits, figs and juicy black currant extract. The aftertaste has some bitterness, with layers of toast and spice coming through strongly.Wine Enthusiast | 91 WE

Wow. This really shows wonderful depth and complexity on the nose with blueberries, fresh flowers and hints of stones. It’s full-bodied, with ultra-refined tannins and a long, long finish. Gets better and better with age: gorgeous now but will improve for many years to come. Excellent.James Suckling | 93 JSTasted at BBR’s 2005/2009 tasting in London. This is a great 2005. The Cantemerle is developing a very attractive, lifted nose with more cedar and crushed stone, hints of freshly rolled tobacco and briary. The palate is medium-bodied with firm tannins, gentle grip, leading to a foursquare but precise finish that does not dare put a foot wrong. Sedate at the moment but sure to open up with time. Classic Bordeaux.Robert Parker Neal Martin | 91 RP-NMShows blackberry and plum skin aromas, with hints of vanilla. Medium- to full-bodied, with soft, velvety tannins and a pretty, fruity aftertaste. An elegant, balanced style. Lingers on the palate. Best after 2012. 33,330 cases made.Wine Spectator | 90 WS

An absolutely sensational second wine from Haut-Brion, the 2005 Bahans Haut-Brion displays all the smoke, gravel and chocolate notes along with ripe black fruits. Broad, savory, rich and lush, this is a sensational wine (now called Le Clarence) with gorgeous texture and length. Drink it over the next 10-15 years.Robert Parker | 93 RPThe 2005 Bahans Haut-Brion is the second wine from Haut-Brion, known today as Le Clarence. A huge, virile red, the 2005 exudes intensity from start to finish. Black cherry, plum, smoke, tobacco, gravel and cured meats blast across the palate. The wine’s richness, heft and power are truly remarkable. Today, the 2005 comes across as shockingly young. This heady, exotic Pessac-Léognan has much to offer. It’s price naturally reflects its position as a second wine to a First Growth, yet the 2005 is a serious wine that has a ton to offer.Antonio Galloni | 93 AGSoft and balanced, showing lovely velvety tannins and lots of coffee, chocolate, toasty oak and mushroom character, with bright fruit underneath. Full-bodied, round and unctuous. Best after 2013. 9,580 cases made.Wine Spectator | 92 WSThe second wine of Château Haut-Brion is firm, mirroring its grand vin. It is dark, brooding and dense, rounded by ripe fruits. There is also an edge of bitter chocolate that offers an intriguing counterpoint to the elegance of the fruit.Wine Enthusiast | 92 WE

One of the strongest efforts I have ever tasted from Alain Vauthier, his small St.-Emilion estate, Moulin Saint-Georges, has turned in a gorgeous 2005 with an opaque purple color and a sweet nose of blueberry and black raspberry fruit along with spring flowers. Rich, full-bodied, and still moderately tannic, this is a wonderful sleeper of the vintage and a wine capable of further evolution for at least another 10-15+ years.Robert Parker | 92 RPDeep, dark ruby in color. Superconcentrated aromas of crushed blackberry, black licorice, espresso and leather follow through to a full body, with ultrafine tannins and loads of coffee and fruit flavors. Very long. Best after 2016.Wine Spectator | 92 WSGood deep red-ruby. Very ripe aromas of currant, licorice and minerals. Broad, fresh and mouthcoating, with a juicy quality to the dark fruit, minerals and sweet oak flavors. Finishes broad, with lovely floral persistence. Not especially complex yet but offers a light touch and excellent energy for the vintage.Vinous Media | 91 VM

This is a beautiful Giscours with tension and finesse. It’s full-bodied and shows plenty of berry and spice character, not to mention a long, silky-textured finish. It seduces you with each sip. Why wait?James Suckling | 95 JSThis chateau gets better and better. The wine has power, but it is harnessed by the intense fruits, the blackberry flavors, the density and the wood. With the power, though, comes elegance, resulting in a wine that is ready to develop over many years.Wine Enthusiast | 95 WEThis is a powerful wine with good ageing potential. The nose is ripe and creamy with plenty of dark fruit and spice complexity. The palate is rich, full and gourmand with Cabernet-cassis notes coming through. There’s a big tannic frame that shows the more masculine side of this Margaux. The finesse may be missing but there’s a lot of wine here. Drinking Window 2021 - 2040.Decanter | 94 DECThe 2005 Giscours captures all the natural radiance of the year in its stylish, racy personality. Sweet tannins wrap around a core of sweet red berry fruit, kirsch, rose petal, mint, spice and blood orange. Soft, curvy and sensual, Giscours is a winner in 2005. It doesn’t quite offer the grandeur of the very finest Left Bank 2005s, but it has plenty of that richness.Antonio Galloni | 93 AGDisplays blackberry, cherry and hints of sweet tobacco. Full-bodied, with soft, velvety tannins and a long, caressing finish. Very pretty and solid. This is structured and chewy. Needs time. Best after 2013. 20,830 cases made.Wine Spectator | 93 WSTasted at the Château Giscours vertical, the 2005 Château Giscours is a blend of 62% Cabernet Sauvignon and 38% Merlot picked between September 22 and October 6. Conspicuously deep in color, both the aromatics and palate replicate the strong performance from earlier this year. The bouquet offers very fine intensity with blackberry and cedar, here a tinge of cassis that becomes accentuated with time. The palate is medium-bodied with fine, slightly grainy tannin. It is very well balanced and almost Saint Julien in style. It is clearly very focused with a sustained, mineral-rich finish that (as I said before) contains real energy. This is an excellent Giscours that will age nicely over the next 20-25 years. Tasted June 2015.Robert Parker Neal Martin | 92 RP-NM

The 2005 Le Pin is a very pretty wine, perhaps a bit more floral and savory and less opulent than it often is. Crushed raspberry, wild flowers, mint and dried herbs all lift from the glass effortlessly. Like most of its peers, the 2005 needs several hours of aeration to be at its best. It is an especially gracious, translucent wine that stands apart stylistically from the typically richer wines that have been made here.Antonio Galloni | 94 AGShows berry tobacco and coffee character on the nose with hints of mushroom and light toasty oak. Full-bodied with lots of berry chocolate and light dried spice character followed by a long finish. Not the 1998 or even the 2001 but outstanding. Best after 2013.Wine Spectator | 94 WSWhile I would not rank the 2005 Le Pin as highly as the 2001, 2000, 1998, 1989, 1983, or 1982, it is still a beautiful wine offering a deep ruby/purple color along with an open-knit nose of caramel, coconut, coffee, melted chocolate, and sweet, jammy black cherry and currant fruit. The alluring fragrance is followed by an opulent, luscious Pomerol with flamboyant flavors of ripe black fruits intermixed with hints of roasted herbs, meat juices, plums, and Asian spices. Unfortunately, the world’s billionaires quickly gobble up Le Pin’s 500 cases, even at preposterously high prices. Anticipated maturity: 2012-2025.Robert Parker | 93 RP

(Louis Roederer Cristal Brut) The 2005 Cristal is a legend in the making, but this wine is still very young and closed and some extended bottle age will be necessary to really allow all of the multi-faceted elements here to blossom and come to the fore. The cépages is the same as for the 2006, fifty-five percent pinot noir and forty-five percent chardonnay, but this does not mean that Jean-Baptiste Lécaillon selected vins clairs from the same crus for the two vintages! The 2005 vintage was considered strongest for chardonnay, so careful selection of pinot noir vins clairs for the Cristal in this vintage was of paramount importance, though the domaine’s superb holdings in Verzenay and Verzy certainly made the selection process a bit easier. The 2005 Cristal offers up a deep, extremely primary and very promising bouquet of apple, pear, a gorgeously complex base of chalky soil tones, incipient nuttiness, citrus peel, smoke, a touch of lavender and a topnote of peach blossoms. On the palate the wine is pure, full-bodied and absolutely rock solid at the core, with great focus and finesse, very refined mousse, a crisp girdle of acidity and great length and laser-like focus on the poised, primary and utterly refined finish. The 2005 is an utterly brilliant Cristal in the making, but give it time to blossom in the cellar! (Drink between 2019-2060)John Gilman | 97 JGThe iconic Roederer Champagne, Cristal’s latest release, brings a perfect balance of richness and age worthiness. It is full of apple flavor, and the mousse is very fine and almost imperceptible. As so often with a beautifully blended wine like this, a few minutes breathing brings out extra complex flavors. It certainly should age over five years and more.Wine Enthusiast | 97 WEThe complexity and youthful freshness here makes a striking Champagne that offers immense pleasure and a certain richness and depth that reflects the style of the vintage with some warmth reflected in the wine. The nose has rich citrus and stone fruits, some white flowers, light creamy honey notes and fresh sweet pastry, it has a toasty thread that has built quickly in the wine. Plenty of body on the palate, it has a wealth of assertive citrus and more exotic fruits too, the power and concentration undeniable, the length impressive and the balance impeccable. Already great drinking here. Slightly higher chardonnay component at around 45%. -NSJames Suckling | 96 JSEvery vintage can’t be 2002, or even 2004. Even so, this is pretty great, an open, airy, whip-smart delivery of Cristal’s spark, a wine of formidable delicacy. The undertow is there, drawing down a wave of spicy oak notes and heady crème caramel to reveal glints of limestone, the bright shimmer of acidity sustained by the cool rootedness in the soil. In 45 words of my notes on this wine, there’s not a single mention of fruit. Instead, they focus on brightness, subtlety, lusty juiciness, balance and mouthwatering complexity.Wine & Spirits | 95 W&S(L036332A109909): Bright yellow-gold. Heady floral-accented citrus and orchard fruits on the nose, with smoky mineral and floral overtones adding complexity. Velvety and chewy in texture, offering deep, juicy orange and poached pear flavors and suave honey and chamomile nuances. Blends precision with power, finishing with a distinct mineral quality and excellent persistence.Vinous Media | 94 VMVibrant and mouthwatering, this offers a range of patisserie pear and apple fruit, candied lemon zest, pastry dough and marzipan notes set on a finely detailed texture, which imparts a great deal of finesse. The lasting finish echoes a smoky mineral note. Drink now through 2025. 20,000 cases imported.Wine Spectator | 94 WS(Louis Roederer Brut - Cristal Champagne/Sparkling) Like the 2006 this is notably ripe with plenty of yeast, brioche and orchard fruit characters but in this case there is no tropicality. There is fine mid-palate density to the relatively powerful and very rich flavors that possess excellent complexity on the lingering finish that really fans out as it sits in the mouth. Like many 2005s this is not an especially refined vintage for Cristal nor does it possess the effervescent punch it usually does. Those aspects duly noted, this certainly cannot be faulted in terms of richness and complexity and for my taste, this is probably drinking about as well as it’s going to though I underscore that it should drink well for many years to come. (Drink starting 2015)Burghound | 93 BHThe 2005 Cristal stands out for its exceptional inner perfume and elegance. Soft, delicate and pretty, the 2005 is a relatively immediate Cristal with all of the signatures very much in the right place. The 2005 doesn’t have the opulence of the 2002 nor the focus of the 2004, but it is a very pretty, if somewhat small-scaled version of this iconic Champagne. I would drink the 2005 while the 2002 and 2004 age. Although Cristal has an impeccable track record when it comes to aging, personally I would not push it with the 2005. Anticipated maturity: 2012-2020.Robert Parker Wine Advocate | 93 RP

Probably the best Fieuzal I have tasted in many a year, the 2005 has a dense purple color and a gorgeous nose of charcoal, graphite, blackcurrants, cherries and earth. It is medium to full-bodied and very rich, with ripe tannin and a multidimensional mouthfeel. This is a superb wine and a great success for the château. Drink it over the next 25+ years.Robert Parker | 94 RPA powerful, dense wine that relies on beautifully smooth ripe fruit, with black tannins underneath all this richness. Flavors of black figs and dried fruits show its extra concentration.Wine Enthusiast | 92 WEEarthy and meaty on the nose, with lots of ripe fruit. Full-bodied, soft and round. There’s loads of Pessac character, with hints of vanilla and coffee. A decadent style. Best after 2011. 8,000 cases made.Wine Spectator | 90 WS

Significantly better from bottle than it was from barrel, the 2005 Rauzan-Gassies appears to be the finest wine this estate has ever produced. Dense purple-hued with a beautiful perfume of camphor, creme de cassis, licorice, bay leaf, and incense, it is a full-bodied, stunningly concentrated, broad, rich Margaux with lovely integrated tannins. This backward 2005 will handsomely repay cellaring. Anticipated maturity: 2014-2030+.Robert Parker | 92 RPSolid, dry tannins, very firm and hard, but they are also ripe. The wine has high extraction, very dark fruit flavors, but resists being too huge. This could well turn out to be a very elegant wine.Wine Enthusiast | 92 WEAll boats rise in a vintage like 2005, and the notoriously sleepy second Rauzan-Gassies turned out to be one of the surprises at our tasting. It starts with a dark scent of tobacco and then cassis pours out of the middle of the wine. At first, the fruit seems a little weak in the finish, but the center feels lush and silken and, with air, the pebbly tannins extend a sleek plummy flavor. You'll get more from the super-seconds, but this is a fine wine on its own terms.Wine & Spirits | 90 W&S

Barrel sample. Very opulent, generous and rich. It shows all the glories of the vintage, with huge but sufficiently restrained fruit, and exuberant tannins.Wine Enthusiast | 93 WEVery aromatic, showing blackberry and currant aromas, with some licorice. Full-bodied, with supersilky tannins and a rich, decadent, fruity finish. Caresses the palate. Stylish and opulent. Best after 2011. 10,000 cases made.Wine Spectator | 93 WSThe 2005 Haut-Bages Libéral is a very young Pauillac that is just beginning to show the first signals of aromatic opening. Sweet dried cherry, mint, spice, licorice and dried flowers all grace this mid-weight Pauillac. Haut-Bages Libéral is not quite as opulent as most other Pauillacs in 2005, and it could have benefitted from a bit more depth, but it is impeccably done and very rewarding today.Antonio Galloni | 91 AGThe 2005 Haut-Bages Libéral offers loads of blackcurrant fruit, licorice, spice and forest floor. It is medium to full-bodied, with supple tannin and an expansive, textured mouthfeel and finish. Drink it over the next 15-20 years.Robert Parker | 90 RP

Superrich in its dark fruit, black herbs and boldly oaked flavors, this is also firm and, in the end, extremely tannic. It finishes dry, the power of the tannin increasing with air, with a grip that will need long bottle aging to relent. Check on it ten years from the vintage.Wine & Spirits | 92 W&SMilk chocolate and blackberry aromas follow through to a full body, with very soft tannins and a long, caressing finish. This is so delicious now, but has a balance of fruit and tannins. One of the best from this estate in some time. Best after 2014. 2,500 cases made.Wine Spectator | 92 WSI recall enjoying this wine from barrel, with its fresh fruit aromatics, solid tannins and fine length. Tasted two years ago in Bordeaux, it again showed freshness but lacked density. Tasty, but not at the level of the 2015. A blend of 75% Merlot, 18% Cabernet Sauvignon and 5% Cabernet Franc. Drinking Window 2018 - 2022Decanter | 90 DECFruity and smoky, this wine succeeds on its charm, with soft tannins, acidity and superripe fruit. With its (for Pomerol) high percentage of Cabernet Sauvignon, the wine certainly has structure, but maybe misses on richness.Wine Enthusiast | 90 WE

Open-knit yet deep and powerful, the 2005 Les Forts de Latour is striking today. The pedigree of the vintage comes through in spades. Expressive, perfumed aromatics meld into a core of supple, open-knit fruit in a mid-weight, impeccably balanced Forts de Latour. Hints of red fruit, iron, smoke and tobacco add lovely shades of nuance. Latour's President Frédéric Engerer adds that that 2005 was the easiest and most balanced growing season (including 2009 and 2010) he has seen because his team had the total flexibility of choosing when to harvest.Vinous Media | 94 VMShows blackberry, coffee, cedar, and raisin on the nose, turning to licorice and fresh flowers. Full-bodied, with refined, silky tannins and a long finish. Balanced and juicy. Builds on the palate, with currant, licorice and mineral character, followed by a powerful finish. An amazing second wine. Best after 2015. 13,330 cases made.Wine Spectator | 94 WSAlways the equivalent of many classed growths, Les Forts de Latour is hardly a second wine, deriving from a particular parcel of the Latour vineyard. This 2005 is beautifully balanced, with lively fresh acidity, dense tannins and ripe, juicy black fruits. The acidity stays right to the end.Wine Enthusiast | 92 WE

From another of the small, well-run properties of proprietor Denis Barraud, the 2005 Lynsolence delivers beautiful plum, black cherry and cassis fruit. Some licorice, underbrush and incense are also present in this complex, medium to full-bodied wine, which has terrific purity, length and overall balance. This wine is just starting to be drinkable and should continue to hold nicely for another 10-12 years.Robert Parker Wine Advocate | 91 RPThe 2005 Lynsolence is a rich, heady Saint-Émilion loaded with inky dark fruit, dried herbs, chocolate, licorice and spice. Although the 2005 has certainly aged well, this style is more enjoyable where there is more fruit, in my view. The 2005 is not exactly in decline, but its best years are behind it.Vinous Media | 90 VMBlackberry and light vanilla aromas follow through to a medium-bodied palate, with silky tannins and a long, caressing finish. Soft and pretty. Best after 2011. 650 cases made.Wine Spectator | 90 WS