2000 Vintage, Chateau-Direct, Spectator Top 100 Bordeaux Blast from the Past
2000 Vintage, Chateau-Direct, Spectator Top 100 Bordeaux Blast from the Past
To all Best Winers,
‘Real wine’.
That was the first note I wrote after my initial 'dig' into a glass of this absolute gem. To be honest, wines of this caliber that sell for this price at this stage of their evolution come around once in a blue moon for most merchants.
But we’re not ‘most merchants’. We are looking for wines as compelling as this one all the time. Even still, ‘looking for’ and ‘finding’ are two different things. When we find them, it’s high fives all around…
We knew the moment we saw this one in the glass that we had ‘found’ something. Deep color, looks fresh as a daisy! After about 15 minutes to ‘wake up’ the nose was all Pessac, just-ripe black fruits redolent with minerals, wet stone, rocks, whatever you want to call them. The rest of our notes were straight and to the point as we are not fluffy-wine-tasting-note people, “Great to drink. A buy.”
After the tasting we headed to dinner with a representative from the company offering out this deal. We brought this Latour Martillac 2000 along to pair up with some local delicacies and the rep brought a surprise wine which we tasted blind. Turned out the ‘surprise’ was a Chateau La Mission Haut Brion from a top vintage in the 90’s, and showing spot-on. Happy on both fronts, we ate, we drank and drank some more.
At the end of the night the bottle of Latour Martillac was empty and the bottle of La Mission still had a fair bit of wine in it. Telling? We think so. It was a clear sign to us that the Latour Martillac was a wine for consuming. Granted, the La Mission may still end up being the better wine at some point but, for this night, it didn’t come close. The La Mission sells for around $300 on today’s market. The Latour Martillac? (Just) under $50. I’ll take a half case of Latour Martillac, please!
Bullet Points!
We’re throwing you a 13 year old bottle from one of Bordeaux’s top estates…
Shipped direct from the chateau…
From one of the region’s greatest vintages ever…
That also happens to be a Wine Spectator Top 100 selection from 2003…
Which we are selling for around the same price as the current release 2010.
92 points & Wine Spectator Top 100! We've personally knocked back probably a case of this over the last year. Drinking great now, it actually overshadowed a very fine vintage of La Mission Haut Brion (served blind) during our last trip to Bordeaux. The Latour Martillac bottle was empty, the La Mission (which was spot-on) half full. That's all you need to know...
