CWD: Disorderly Adjacent 2016 Bordeaux

I’d love to have an open mind and try 16 DDC. It seems that if any recent vintage will show the new look in its best light, it’s probably 16.

Pavel, should we share a test bottle?
 
originally posted by Jayson Cohen:
I’d love to have an open mind and try 16 DDC. It seems that if any recent vintage will show the new look in its best light, it’s probably 16.

Pavel, should we share a test bottle?
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"A strange game. The only winning move is not to play. How about a nice game of chess?"
 
Robert: yes.

Jayson: I've also read that '18 is very pretty if you give it a couple hours to open up.

Pavel: I define a nice game as one that I win. Is that your meaning, too?
 
originally posted by VLM:
originally posted by Keith Levenberg:
I love Graves and have drunk tons of DDC across multiple eras. They've changed - almost everything has - but it's still one of the top estates in Graves. I actually find the change in Haut Bailly more dramatic than at DDC. DDC being half the price makes it a very worthwhile buy for me. Also, bonus points for the Diam corks.
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Well, I've got 2000, 2015 and 2016 on the way so I'll see for myself. I haven't had a post 2000 DdC IRCC.

I also grabbed a 2016 Giscours for comparison. I might grab a couple other things locally and make it a hootenanny.
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I quite liked the 2015 DdC and Giscours. Post some notes if you open them, it would be fun to see what others think.
 
Sitting with the 2016 Dom de Chevalier tonight (first of a batch of 16/18 Bordeaux I'll be exploring over the next few months), and really digging this. It may not be "old" DDC but I love the balance here and it's damn good wine that shows a sense of place.

There's bright acidity, alcohol's perfectly reasonable (13.5 on the label), and it's only been getting better and more aromatically compelling over the past 3 hours. Didn't love it initially, but time in the decanter has helped a lot and I'll be happy to drink another of these in a decade or two.
 
originally posted by Salil Benegal:
Sitting with the 2016 Dom de Chevalier tonight (first of a batch of 16/18 Bordeaux I'll be exploring over the next few months), and really digging this. It may not be "old" DDC but I love the balance here and it's damn good wine that shows a sense of place.

There's bright acidity, alcohol's perfectly reasonable (13.5 on the label), and it's only been getting better and more aromatically compelling over the past 3 hours. Didn't love it initially, but time in the decanter has helped a lot and I'll be happy to drink another of these in a decade or two.
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Different strokes I guess. I thought even on Day 2 when the acidity came out a little more that the aromatics and fruit were carried by the oak and alcohol, and I didn’t recognize the structure of classic red Bordeaux for aging. But time will tell.
 
I will say that I found the oak well balanced in the bottle I had last night. I can't say that about the 2016 Giscours, which I found a little bitter (both in both the oaky and tannic sense) and rather disappointing based on a couple of glasses tonight.
 
Whether 2016 DDC has "bright acidity" or not, its contribution to the wine's structure (at least in the bottle Jayson and I shared last Sunday) is non-existent. Especially in the finish.

A sense of what place does it show? It very well may, as long as we establish that the place is not Léognan.

I may not be as diplomatic as my friend Jayson, but what we choose to drink and not to drink around here is actually kind of important. Unlike in other places.
 
I can get why people seeking ultraclassic, British-palate style claret would be less than enthused by the recent DDCs, but I honestly don't understand finding it offensively modern as if it were a Rolland wine packed with jam and coffee grounds. Curious how the detractors feel about, say, the '18 Haut-Bailly, which as I mentioned seems to have hit the 'roids way harder than DDC.
 
originally posted by Keith Levenberg:
I can get why people seeking ultraclassic, British-palate style claret would be less than enthused by the recent DDCs, but I honestly don't understand finding it offensively modern as if it were a Rolland wine packed with jam and coffee grounds. Curious how the detractors feel about, say, the '18 Haut-Bailly, which as I mentioned seems to have hit the 'roids way harder than DDC.
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I never thought of my palate at British. And I never said I find it offensively modern, counselor. (So we are not really talking about a full-blown race to the bottom.) That doesn’t mean I should be happy with Graves that doesn’t taste like Graves, let alone the DDC I know and love. Nor does it mean I need to apologize for any Bordeaux that is not compelling just because it doesn’t fit the Rolland model.
 
Doesn't Keith have a good point here?

The left bank (initially even more so in Graves) has its tradition firmly entwined with British sensibility. When we talk about that loose idea of terroir, surely we mean traditional cépage, traditional élevage in additional to tradition methods in the vineyards.

I freely admit that places like Pape Clément have sailed over my personal event horizon, and others (Lascombes, Giscours) aren't even worth considering for BDX. But with my my stocks of Latour Haut-Brion dwindling (how much money does a Banker-Prince need?) I have no problem turning to DCC and Haut Bailly to scratch the Pessac itch. I haven't tried the '16 DCC, but the '15 was good enough for me to buy a half case, something I almost never do any more. I can't imagine the style has changed so radically in one vintage.
 
Doesn’t really scratch the Pessac itch, or any itch. It’s a little bizarre that we are taking about British sensitivities, rather than what used to get into the bottle and drunk with pleasure on this side of the pond. And still is drunk with pleasure from older bottles. But, however you want to think of it because of history, ok.

Terroir is a well worn subject as we all know. So not going there.

I will say that DDC and Haut Bailly and Pape Clement, for whatever reasons, were distinctive wines from each other. Year in, year out. Each wonderful in its own way. And nothing I ever associated with Brits.
 
originally posted by Jayson Cohen:
It’s a little bizarre that we are taking about British sensitivities, rather than what used to get into the bottle and drunk with pleasure on this side of the pond. And still is drunk with pleasure from older bottles.
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I'd point out I selected "sensibility" and not sensitivity. You can perhaps correct me if I am wrong, but a lot of the revulsion against spoof (here, elsewhere) is just how different spoofed wine is from the traditional. We can see that aspect of our discussion in this very thread. ie -- the note above that -- to some -- DCC doesn't taste like it did before 2000. So I ask the question, what were the forces that lead to that sensibility? Why did DCC taste like it did before spoof? And unquestionably that historical thread leads to a long historical association with imports to the UK.
 
originally posted by Pavel Tchichikov:
originally posted by Tristan Welles:
Doesn't Keith have a good point here?
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Shouldn't we be posing these questions to the Brits among us, then?
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I don't often notice a non sequitur on WD! Mirabile dictu!

My point is that tasting DCC and assessing the long arc of its profile one would see that it was indeed a reflection of its primary market.

I have no doubt that the '16 was displeasing on grounds of spoof / non-spoof as you assert. Having tasted, from memory, the 00, 02, 04, 08, 12 and 15, my general point is that they seem not to vary greatly from exemplars from the 80s and 90s. The one main difference I can readily identify is riper material in obviously riper years.
 
I've had the 2000 and 2016 DCC in the last month. The 2000 was pretty good and very Graves/Pessac in my mind. I bought it recently and it was pricey (~$170). So while I liked it, I don't know think I'll buy more for the cellar. The 2016 was a different beast, but we also liked it but in a different way. It had a lot more fruit and a real velvety texture. I didn't find it too prominently oaked but texturally it seemed like it was from a different era. There were some of that mineral and earth tones that I associate with Pessac but it was really about the silky fruit and length. I imagine that with age it will show more of the earthy/mineral elements but I don't know. I asked if we should get more and gave the price ($90, but can be found for $80), the response was, "I don't know, that seems kind of expensive." I have a bottle of 2015 to try and if it's similar, I think I'll buy a few for the cellar but it doesn't seem like something that would become a cornerstone.

What are the specific spoofs that people object to? I think that the silkiness and fruit depth can be attributed to farming and warming unless there is something else at play that would effect the way the wine would age like R/O. I expect that I have a higher tolerance of

All of this Bordeaux exploration came from having a couple of really great bottles from my dad's cellar and apart from Magdelaine, I own 1 case of assorted Bordeaux and 1 case of Lafon-Rochet I don't have any Bordeaux in my cellar. I like a good Bordeaux and am locking to add some to the cellar and DCC seemed a logical choice.

For the record, I'm not English but my wife studied at Oxford and lived in London.
 
They haven't been discussed in this thread, so I'll call out the Bel Air Marquis d'Aligre wines (sometimes referred to as BAMA). As I've said, I drink very little Bordeaux. That said, I understand these are atypical and a throwback not so much to the 1960s or 1970s, but to the 19th Century or early 20th Century. They are scarce, but CSW gets some every so often. There's good info on the domaine online. VLM, you should check them out if you haven't. They may not scratch the Bordeaux itch for you, but I'd be surprised if you didn't like them. They might even be worth going outside NC for.
 
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