CHÂTEAU LATOUR 750ML 2019

A seductive sweetness to the fruit on the attack, this waits a heartbeat then explodes out of the glass, overflowing with raspberry, redcurrants, black cherries, cassis and iris flowers. A silky confident and extremely well-controlled Latour where you can feel the precision and the inching forward through the palate of the different elements. It feels both extremely delicate at one level, yet expansive and concentrated, particularly from the mid palate onwards with a grip of tannins that lifts, expands and keeps on going. Those clay-gravel soils have meant there is not a hint of fig or prune, instead it is rich and fresh and very juicy. I love how Latour has re-framed itself in recent years with the move to biodynamics and yet shown that a truly great estate can evolve without losing its brilliance. 100% new oak, tannin count 78IPT, 36% of overall production in the first wine. 98-100.

The 2019 Latour is a profound wine in the making, and it will surely emerge as one of the most long-lived wines of the vintage, as well as one of the greatest. Unwinding in the glass with scents of rich cassis fruit, English walnuts, cigar wrapper, black truffle, loamy soil and violets, it’s full-bodied, layered and muscular, with huge depth at the core, ripe tannins and lively acids, concluding with a long, seemingly interminable finish. Checking in at 14.1% alcohol, this prodigious Latour will require two decades to hit its stride, but it will be more than worth the wait.