Hopefully you weren’t holding your breath. The delay in getting Part 2 of my review of the Grands Crus Classés of St Emilion up and published was due to a combination of COVID over the winter break and then the volume of other work in January which blew me off track. Anyhow, finally here is my summary of the second tranche of twenty-one 2018s St Emilion classed growths tasted last September. Again, these are a generally rich and ripe set of wines, some quite precocious, and many already a joyful drink. Alongside these, properties also showed one other vintage. As in my earlier piece, the 2016s really impressed, but so too did many 2017s. So what are the picks?

In early October I had the opportunity to taste a set of wines spanning the last decade from the Médoc property Château Loudenne with General Manager Philippe de Poyferré. I’ve been particularly struck by the quality of the wines here in recent years at tastings in Bordeaux. This was a chance to look at the wines in detail, following significant investments in the estate over the last six years, after it came into new ownership in 2013. It’s a property I’m familiar with. A good friend of mine from university worked at Loudenne in the early 1990s. He shared bottles from the 1989 and 1990 vintages, which I remember showing plenty of extract and structure. More recently the Loudenne 2014 and 2015 vintages caught my eye during primeurs visits and this year again, with an exciting 2019.

The estate of Clos L’Eglise in Pomerol is run by Hélène Garcin Lévêque, and her family have been the custodians of this estate since they acquired it in 1997, writes John Willis. The property, which dates back to the 18th Century, used to be 14 hectares, double the size it is today. The missing half went to form part of Château L’Eglise Clinet in 1954. The size of Clos L’Eglise is small (even by Pomerol standards) with only 5.9 ha under vine at present. Tasting the vintages from 1997-2016 was a fantastic insight into the overall philosophy of this estate and shows the general improvement of the wines across the period. A genuine sense of place, of terroir, comes across in the wines of this ambitious Pomerol, something to which many properties aspire but sometimes fail to achieve. 

A dozen red wines from the Graves appellation in 2014 showed fresh, vibrant flavours. The picks for me were Château de Chantegrive, Château Ferrande and Château Rahoul. Solid wines have also been made at Château de Cerons, Grand Enclos du Château Cérons, Château Crabitey and Château Haura. These wines are not overly concentrated, but display vigour and some style, and are usually well priced.