Yesterday I was lucky enough to have a kind of wine epiphany. Tasting as much as I do (and that is little compared to others!) from time to time you get a little jaded. Great wines comes along but sometimes you need a real eye opener to get you to really appreciate the magic that wine is.
Yesterday was such a moment.
I went to my stock of 64´s and took out a single bottle of Château Palmer. Even though Palmer picked before the famous rainfall of the 8th of October it have never had a great reputation, Broadbent and Parker dismisses it, while Coates and Durand thinks it is a fine 1964 but that it should have drunk long ago.
This bottle had a high shoulder level, good for it is age but not great. So all in all, I had no high expectations.
1964 Château Palmer
It opens, as usual with old bottles, a bit closed and murky. But with only some time in the glass this caterpillar turns into a butterfly.
What flows up from the glass is beautiful aromas of dried rowanberries, dried flowers, owen baked beet roots, gravel, old leather and the finest tobacco money can buy. Aristocratic down to the core. A very fine warmth. There is a silky yet penetrating scent that is hard to describe and that only can come from a perfect aged wine. And this bottle has that in spades. Really, really fine.
The taste is round, mature and silky with fully integrated tannins and lovely notes of red currants, dried flowers, leather, some pencil shavings and again, the best tobacco there is. The finish isn´t that long but oh so seductive and refined. Like an grand old lady that with just wink of her hand or a raised eye brow can get her message through. And there is no arguing! Not the best wine so far this year but a privilege to drink and definitely one of the most memorable. Grand Vin!
94p (tasted 2014/07)
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