WTN: 1st growth with old friends (all vaccinated)

After almost a 15 month break, our long time Bordeaux group got together for dinner at Nice Matin. Nice service, a big open cabana to ourselves. While we caught up we had some fried baby artichoke, meze dips, tuna tartare, and a bottle off the list, the 2016 Bereche ? Les Monts Fournois? Coteaux Champenois blanc. A real unicorn, very interesting, lots of body, citrus, floral, and chalk. Fun to try. B+/B

On to the reds. As this was a long anticipated event, we went big with a 1st growth theme.

My starter was chicken sausage ravioli with morels and peas

1985 Ch. Mouton Rothschild Sweet, fairly delicate and mature, cigarbox and leather.. B/B+

1988 Ch. Haut Brion A bit tight at first, but nice black fruit, mostly resolved tannin, lots of tobacco and leather. B+

1983 Ch. Margaux A really great bottle of this. Elegant and long, black fruit with spice and smoke, classy finish. A-

My main was duck breast with gingery carrot puree, ramps, & maitakes

1990 Ch. Lafite Rothschild Ripe, verging on roasted but not quite, some dirt and a little barnyard, B

1995 Ch. Lafite Rothschild Surprisingly open though still structured, cassis with ferric notes and cedar, very good length. B+

1998 Ch. Haut Brion Young and structured but strutting, sandalwood and spice over black currant and plum, great length. A-

1996 Ch. Lafite Rothschild Dark fruit, graphite, broad tannins, I think this will be great but pretty reserved right now. For current drinking B+/B

1996 Ch. Latour If Lafite is reserved this is positively brooding. Just all structure, but again confident this will be excellent. For now B

1986 Ch. Mouton Rothschild Wow, I like to poke fun at Mouton?s ascent to first growth, but this is a fine argument for it. Powerful and young, plush black fruit with exotic spice, coffee, and cedar notes. Totally delicious. A-/A

In weighted voting

86 Mouton 20.5 points 83 Margaux 18 95 Lefite 8.5 98 HB 6 85 Mouton 1

Really great to be with everyone in person. Fun night, except my mad sprint at Grand Central after world?s most clueless Uber driver turned a 12 minute drive into 25.

Grade disclaimer: I'm a very easy grader, basically A is an excellent wine, B a good wine, C drinkable. Anything below C means I wouldn't drink at a party where it was only choice.Furthermore, I offer no promises of objectivity, accuracy, and certainly not of consistency.