Halliday Wine Companion (94)

True to this cool season, a pretty and elegant Magill Estate of lively acidity, tangy berry fruits and savoury accents. It soaks up 100% new oak effortlessly (65/35% French/American), making space for flavours of licorice, black olives, pepper and exotic spice. No great Magill, but certainly an engaging and commendable result.

Wine Enthusiast (97)

As always, this Pinot Noir-dominated Champagne is a great wine. In this vintage, it is fuller than usual, perhaps less structured—a true reflection of the vintage. Like all releases of this cuvée, the wine will age magnificently. Drink now or hold for at least 10 years to get full maturity.

Wine Advocate (100)

Deep garnet colored, the 2009 Pontet-Canet is a little shut down to begin, but with coaxing this baby is soon firing on all cylinders with a full-throttle nose of chocolate-covered cherries, crème de cassis, boysenberries and spice cake plus tons of kirsch and cranberry sauce sparks and a beautiful undercurrent of emerging tertiary characters: cigar box, sandalwood, chargrill, truffles and cast iron pan. Full-bodied, rich, multilayered and completely seductive, the palate is charged with incredible energy, with a firm backbone of velvety tannins and seamless freshness providing solid grounding and promising a very long life ahead. It finishes with an incredible display of epically long-lasting flavor fireworks. Wow!

Wine Advocate (100)

Deep garnet colored, the 2009 Pontet-Canet is a little shut down to begin, but with coaxing this baby is soon firing on all cylinders with a full-throttle nose of chocolate-covered cherries, crème de cassis, boysenberries and spice cake plus tons of kirsch and cranberry sauce sparks and a beautiful undercurrent of emerging tertiary characters: cigar box, sandalwood, chargrill, truffles and cast iron pan. Full-bodied, rich, multilayered and completely seductive, the palate is charged with incredible energy, with a firm backbone of velvety tannins and seamless freshness providing solid grounding and promising a very long life ahead. It finishes with an incredible display of epically long-lasting flavor fireworks. Wow!

Contains 1 bottle each of Beauséjour Duffau, Clinet, Clos Fourtet, Cos d'Estournel, Ducru Beaucaillou, Evangile, Léoville Poyferré, Montrose, Pavie, Pontet Canet, Smith Haut Lafitte Rouge and Pape Clement Blanc

Wine Advocate (95)

This wine is only made in the best vintages, and the next release is 2011. The 2009 Amarone della Valpolicella Classico is a mysteriously ephemeral wine but also a very powerful one at the same time. The alcohol content is 16.5%, and this is one of the most important indicators used when deciding that a vintage is good enough to make Amarone. This wine shows a deep, dark color that is reinforced by thick density and smoky aromas that lift from the glass, followed by exotic spice, campfire ash, camphor and plenty of dark plummy and raisiny fruit. The bouquet reveals outlying aromas of bitter chocolate and crushed slate. In the mouth, the wine offers plenty of ripeness and fruity sweetness, but there is enough supporting structure here to absorb both the sugar and the alcohol. There is a sweetly fragrant earthy note on the long and silky finish.

Vinous (93-96)

Good bright, deep red. Aromas of black raspberry, rose petal and menthol show an almost liqueur-like ripeness. Then wonderfully sappy and vinous in the mouth, with a powerful crushed stone element giving punch to the creamy mid-palate. This is in the style of Potel's Lavaux Saint-Jaques, offering outstanding precision and class and a powerful impression of energy. Can't quite match the Chambertin for sheer grip but this wine is like a wake-up call to the taste buds. (The Griottes-Chambertin, which finished its malo later, was quite youthfully clenched and oaky, and impossible to assess with confidence.)

The Eleven Confessions vineyard is a 33-acre plot located in the Santa Rita Hills AVA, which is widely known to be a cool climate region. True to their spirit of being non-conformists, the Krankls chose to focus primarily on Rhône varietals, dedicating 22 aces to Syrah, Grenache and some Rhône whites - while leaving the remaining 11 acres to Pinot Noir planted by the former ranch owner. The cool climate allows a longer hang-time for the grapes to develop full phenolic ripeness. Also, the Krankls kept yields very low, resulting in the phenomenal concentration that their wines are well-known for.

 

Made of a blend of approximately 97% Syrah with Roussane and Viognier completing the blend, the 2011 Syrah Patine earned a massive 98 points from Jeb Dunnuck and 96 pointsfrom Antonio Galloni, delivering “Guigal La Landonne like aromas and flavors of graphite, sweet oak, smoked meats, pepper and black raspberry and cassis-like fruit " (Dunnuck). Galloni finds “mocha, plums, violets, bittersweet chocolate and dark spice” from this “deep, powerful and intense” wine that he thinks will drink well out to 2035.

Scoring 98 points from the Wine Advocate's Lisa Perrotti-Brown, 97 points from Decanter's Jane Anson and 18.5/20 from Jancis Robinson MW, this 2009 "remains the benchmark Suduiraut of recent years".

 

Still taking a while to open up fully, indicting a very long life ahead, it has a "divine bouquet... building layer upon layer" (NM) that "seductively unfurls" (WA) with gorgeous notes of honey, dried pineapple, chamomile tea, yellow flowers and nectarine. The rich, viscous and satiny texture of the palate is "effortlessly" countered by a "beautiful razor-sharp line of acidity" (NM) that gives this Sauternes bags of freshness. With "epic length and depth" (WA) on the finish, this is a wine that will span generations with Neal Martin giving it a drinking window up to 2070.

Wine Advocate (97+)

The 2011 Quinta de Vargellas Vinha Velha Vintage Port is a typical field blend aged in used French oak vats. It comes in with 105 grams per liter of residual sugar. The youngest, fleshiest and fullest (perhaps because it is the youngest) of this vertical except for the unbottled 2017, this is also one of the most delicious. The fruit is so delectable that, at first, you don't notice how much pure power it has. Then, it's gorgeously textured, precise, focused and penetrating.

Halliday Wine Companion (95)

One of the most daring releases of recent times, not so much for its blend of shiraz, pinot noir and sauvignon blanc as its bold shot at 100% whole bunch fermentation in the cold, wet '11, from a vineyard so run down it almost didn't crop at all. Bill Downie has worked his magic to create a hauntingly ethereal wine of internal harmony, silky structure and captivating exoticism.

Wine Advocate (96)

One of the stars of the vintage, the 2011 Vieux Château Certan was brilliant from barrel (I vividly remember tasting it as a student), and it is beginning to show all of that potential in bottle. Wafting from the glass with inviting aromas of mulberries, cherries, vine smoke, bitter chocolate, violets and spices, framed by a deft application of classy new oak, it's medium to full-bodied, velvety and layered, with terrific concentration, powdery tannins and a long, sapid finish. Even better, this terrific wine remains notably undervalued in the market today.

Vinous (96)

The 2009 Blanc de Blancs Les Blanches Voies is every bit as stunning as it was last year. The combination of the warm year and the natural richness conferred by these 70+- year-old vines yields a powerful, vinous Champagne with tremendous character, depth and the pedigree to drink well for many years. Laurent Champs gave the Blanc de Blancs 7 years on the cork, as opposed to the 6 that are customary for the Coeur de Cuvée. Dosage is 4 grams per liter. Disgorged: March, 2017.