August Lunch Notes

I have a few bottles of 1970 Haut Brion, and it still is holding well. It is not as intense and concentrated as the 70 Mouton, but better balanced, in my opinion. Lafite and Margaux 1970 are several steps down. Latour 1970 is still youthful, and perhaps is the wine of the vintage - excluding Petrus, it unfortunately is now one of the most expensive wines of the vintage if you have to buy it at auction now.

The 70 HB was not as mediocre as Parker made out. It is probably a tad past it now and was better 10 years ago, but it is holding fairly well. I'd suggest that drinking your bottles sooner rather than later would afford you more pleasure.

The Latour is monumental and IMHO the equal of the Petrus, especially given price.

I had a whole case of Haut Brion at one time, and have been drinking it for many years. It has been ready a long time, but I do not detect any decline in recent bottles. It has been stored under good, cool conditions since release. I had no idea of what Parker thought, until you mentioned it. I quit paying any attention to him many years ago.I have seen mixed fairly recent reviews from the UK. I suspect there may be considerable bottle variation in the 1970 HB, considering that some of the tasting reports were from people who often have much the same impressions of a wine as I do. According to auction price reports in the Aug. 2007 Decanter, 1970 HB is selling for about 920 Pounds per case, more than Lafite, Margaux, Mouton. Cheval Blanc is a bit more at 1058 Pounds. Next comes Petrus at 6050 Pounds, not unusual for Petrus. Latour is at the top at 6670 Pounds - ouch!. This is one of the few cases where Latour sells for more than Petrus for a given year. Contrast this with that darling-of-the-auction-room, 1982. A case of Latour goes for 13225 Pounds while Petrus goes for 29900 Pounds. At this point even at the high price, Latour 1970 likely is a much better bargin than Latour 1982, since the reputation of 1970 as a whole is not as high as 1982.

I would say, with a few exceptions such as Latour, you should carefully check most 1970 red Bordeaux ever several years now, if you still have a few bottles of a single wine. There are some that are now way past their best, even if properly stored.