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Uutiset
This is very dense and tight with a super center palate of dark fruit with blackberries and currants. Full-bodied, so precise and focused. Great length and depth. Superb. Classic great Bordeaux. Wow. Pure cabernet sauvignon.
James Suckling 98-99p
The 2017 Latour is very deep purple-black in color and sings of crème de cassis, warm plums, blackberry pie and cinnamon stick with hints of sandalwood, violets, star anise, baker’s chocolate and a touch of beef drippings. Medium-bodied, firm, grainy and very structured with taut, sustained mid-palate fruit, it gives loads of black fruit and spice layers and a very long, mineral-tinged finish.
Wine Advocate 97-99p
Viinin Kuvailu
The Story
The chateau makes three different wines. The so-called grand vin, that is Château Latour itself, a second wine called Les Forts de Latour and a third wine simply called Pauillac. The grand vin comes from the original part of the vineyards, called the Enclos. This is the most prestigious part of the vineyard where the vines have a fine view of the Gironde estuary. The tradition in Bordeaux says that vines that overlook the water make the best wine. The proximity to the estuary actually gives a slightly higher temperature, helping the grapes to good maturity. The Enclos is around 45 hectares out of a total of 88 for the whole estate.
The grape varieties are 75 % Cabernet Sauvignon, 23 % Merlot, 1 % Cabernet Franc and 1 % of Petit Verdot. The planting density is high, 10,000 vines per hectare. Every year the chateau’s viticulturist replaces a certain number of dead vines. These young vines are marked and treated separately. They are harvested separately and they are not used in the grand vin until they are at least 10 years old.
The Enclos is under conversion to organic farming since 2015. It takes three years to be certified so it means that we will see the first organic Château Latour in 2018. Only copper and sulfur, mixed with different plant infusions, are used to fight diseases in the vineyard. Instead of insecticides they use sexual confusion. Only organic fertilizers are used when needed and no herbicides.
The barrel aging starts in December. Château Latour is put in 100 % new oak from the Allier and Nièvre forest in the central part of France. The chateau works with 11 different coopers. This is important to the winemaker as the coopers all have different styles.
The wine spends six months in the first year cellar where it will also undergo the malolactic fermentation. The barrels are tasted regularly and the winemaker decides the blend for the grand vin, the second wine and the third wine. He decides if the press wine should be included or not. The wine is then moved to the huge and magnificent second-year cellar where it will spend 10-13 months, so in total around 22 months of aging before it is bottled. 2014 was bottled in June this year. During the barrel aging the wine is racked and topped up regularly, every 3 months. At the end, the wine is fined traditionally with egg whites, 5-6 whites per barrel.
Château Latour is often a textbook example of a Cabernet Sauvignon. No wonder, as often almost 90 % of the wine is made from this grape. It is a powerful wine in its youth, with aromas of cedar wood and black fruit, made even more powerful with the aging in 100 % new oak barrels. It is packed with fruit and tannins and it stays young for at least 10 years. This is a wine you really should wait for, say 10-15 year or longer. It needs time to show what it is capable of.
Wine Information
A heterogeneous vintage, 2017 will remain in the memory of a lot of vintners with very mixed feelings. An early bud break put hopes very high for a good vintage. These hopes were destroyed by a frost period of historical dimensions. On April 20 an 21 as well as on April 27 and 28 the frost destroyed 30 to 50% of the harvest in the Gironde area, though the best terroirs and famous appellations have been less affected. An early and regular flowering set new hopes. Summer was very dry and the harvest was quite early, even accelerated by rain at the beginning of September. This was rather a problem for the Merlot grapes than for Cabernets. The Cabernet-Sauvignon took advantage of a dry Indian Summer.
Overall the vintage produced remarkable dry white wines above the qualities of 2015 and 2016. The sweet wines took advantage of a fast and regular Botrytis resulting in great wines. The red wines are in general more heterogeneous. However, concerning the wines tasted and presented below, it is a vintage without aromas of peppers and vegetal components, therefore suggesting a good ripening level. For the vineyards suffering frost, often the second generation of grapes had to be used to produce wine. These wines are less impressive than the previous vintages. The best terroirs were offering wines with expressive fruit with a character allowing a good evolution.
On the left bank, Pauillac was doing remarkably well as well as Saint-Julien and generally the vineyards facing the river. On the right bank the situation is much more heterogeneous, with very good results on the plateau calcaire of Saint-Emilion and the centre of the plateau de Pomerol. Overall fruit is dominating the tasting notes and at this early stage, the aromatic expression is mainly based on red and dark berries and stone fruit for the reds.
For the whites the range goes from yellow fruits and citrus fruits up to tropical fruits especially in the sweet wines. Looking back to the last vintages ending on "7" it seems, that this vintage again respects a certain "7"-Tradition. It is a vintage bringing back Bordeaux to its roots, offering a very classic wine style with lower alcohol levels than in the previous years but with often excellent aromatic expression. 2015 and 2016 have surely been better vintages than last year, but based on a first impression 2017 seems to be better than 2014. The evolution will show, that 2017 is far from becoming a "forgotten vintage". Some nice surprises will be waiting for us.
Markus del Monego MW
Vuosikerta 2017
Bordeaux 2017 - A year of contrast
Life is not fair and neither is nature. As the earth warms, flowering becomes earlier and the risk of frost damage increases. Few winemakers remember the frosts of 1991, but their legacy is still haunting. When meteorologists predicted a cold blast on the nights of April 27 and 28, there was a real sense of panic. Most with the means deployed, candles, wind turbines, helicopters, lit hay, took all the measures they could - the others left it to chance.
The best protection was provided by nature; proximity to the Gironde and the altitude. These are not at all the best terroirs. Large Médoc estates such as Léoville Las Cases, Pichon Comtesse and Montrose reported virtually no frost damage. Likewise in Pomerol, Château Lafleur, Petrus, Vieux Château Certan and all the other big names on the Pomerol plateau were unscathed. There were some notable casualties such as Cheval Blanc and Figeac, but the damage was far from catastrophic and the resulting wines are both spectacular.
Those located on low altitude vineyards in St Emilion or further away from the Gironde estuary in the Médoc had no natural protection. Here the mercury fell below the critical level and the damage from the frost was devastating. In places, the entire harvest was lost. Winegrowers had to wait patiently and hope for a second generation bud. In most cases, the second generation was futile.
Those partially affected by the frost mainly lost their less favorable terroirs and their plots planted with young vines, normally designated as secondary and generic wines. A natural selection if you will... Statistically, 2017 is not a good reading for Bordeaux as a whole; Appellations that produce wine in bulk have been hit hard. Total production amounted to 3.5 million hectoliters, around 40% less than in 2016. However, yields from higher châteaux are relatively normal and if they are declining, this is usually attributed to small berries caused by drought conditions in July and August.
2017 is best summarized as an early vintage with significant water stress. Bud break, flowering, veraison and harvest were all two weeks ahead of the norm. Fortunately, there was enough rain in June to carry the vines through the drought of July and August. Average temperatures in July and August were not remarkable, although some châteaux pointed out that alternating temperatures from hot to cold days favored ripening. September brought much needed rain and cooler conditions. The nights were particularly cool, which helped prevent botrytis and maintain low pH levels. The latter part of the month saw a return to dry conditions which allowed the Cabernets to reach full maturity.
And what about wines? Statistics can provide rationalizations, but they can't tell you what wines taste like. As Baptiste Guinaudeau says, the 2017s clearly fit into the trilogy of vintages affected by water constraints, 2015, 2016 and 2017. There is a wonderful and refreshing acidity and vitality to the fruit. Very moderate alcohol level, a bit like in 2016. The wines are vibrant and aromatic. Due to the small berries there is good color and the quality of the press wines is very interesting. As 2017 did not have the heat of 2015 and 2016, they are generally not as broad as their predecessors, however, the key was to extract gently then use the high quality press wines to fill out the middle of mouth. There are dozens of successes. The winegrowers who were friendly and let their terroirs speak have triumphed. Olivier Berrouet's Petrus is absolutely exceptional, Château Lafleur and Percesses de Lafleur speak of purity and breed, Canon, Ausone, Cheval Blanc, Figeac and Tertre Roteboeuf have all produced worthy successors to their 2015 and 2016. On the left bank , Château Margaux may be in a class of its own, but Mouton Rothschild, Haut Brion, La Mission Haut Brion, Montrose, Pichon Comtesse and Léoville Las Cases all came from the top drawer, and there are many more worthy ones of mention: Grand Puy Lacoste, Smith Haut Lafitte, Haut Bailly, Léoville Barton, Lynch Bages, Ducru Beaucaillou, Calon Segur, Palmer, Pichon Longueville, Brane Cantenac and Rauzan Segla.
