Beschreibung:

Château Cheval-Blanc Always so reticent en primeur, perhaps on account of its Cabernet Franc reserved character, hiding its Merlot attributes and not yet sufficient to carry the wine with just its finesse, I always underestimate Cheval Blanc when I first go there to taste each year. I find it very hard to unearth all its hidden charms that come out later. Maybe it was for this reason that in 1852, when Jean Laussac Fourcaud married Henriette Ducasse, that the Graves of Saint Emilion (Cheval, Figeac etc) were considered vastly inferior to the Côtes (Pavie, Ausone etc) and fetched subsequently much lower prices. Then came those magic Cheval Blanc vintages : 1893, 1899, 1900, 1921, 1947 and, from then on, their reputation was made. Of course I have all these vintages every day for breakfast, but the old Chevals that come my way tend to be the odd vintages, which have always showed a lot of class : the '71 at the Christie's Delor sale tasting in 1976, beautifully round and Evangile-styled ; the '64 at the Peninsula Hotel in Hong Kong in 1979 with the Yen Brothers, still totally rich and beguilingly sweet ; even the lowly '69 in Tokyo at my Japanese importer's home in 1981 still vaguely rich and fine ; and what about the wartime '41 in clear glass served at Hauterive restaurant, Bouliac (before Amat took it over and made it swish) with its flickering aromas of sweet Cab Franc. In this catalogue, we are presenting a whole host of vintages, which, as I claim above, seem to me to be as pleasurable in the lesser vintages, and also in those that are considered a bit too old, as in the hit vintages. The 1982 was always very complete, first tasted en primeur with M. Hébrard, who was almost apologising for its precocious beauty....which will last for a long long time The 1983 was less tannicly rich but very attractive and still is. The 1988 showed very austere en primeur but which staged a good comeback just recently and the similarly-styled 1995 also very tannic en primeur and far from ready when tasted in New York in 2013. The 1993 was very profound for the vintage and is certainly still holding up very well The 1996 was always of pronounced Cabernet Franc elegance and reserve The 1997 en primeur was even more Cab Franc orientated (70%) yet very seductive in texture. The great more modern vintages of 1998 (has continually outperformed the primeur tastings), of 2000 (a very complete more Merlot oriented wine), of 2005 (for me by far the mots impressive vintage of this selection with a fantastic combo of tight structure and dark fruits) Not forgetting the lighter but elegant '99, the juicy '01 that really shone in Southwold in 2004, the untypically fine (for such a hot vintage) '03 and the quite evolved '04, which did even better blind at Southwold in 2005. Château Cheval-Blanc 1982 Saint-Émilion, 1er grand cru classé (A) In original wooden case. Slightly corroded capsules. Good appearance. Levels: base of neck or better 12 bottles per lot