1995 Château Grand-Puy-Lacoste: Perfectly ripe cassis, some leather, cedar and graphite. Fruit is crisp and detailed in the mouth. There’s tannic chew and depth and length are good. I love the wine’s balance and lick of bright acidity.
I went big on this wine as futures ($68/bottle), sight unseen. So I tried a bottle on release and was really blown away. I then buried my remaining bottles deep and I’ve keep my hands off, but I might have to start digging into these based on this note.
Incidentally, Parker loved this on release (95 pts), but downgraded it in his 10 year retrospective of the 2005 vintage (92 pts).
I guess my (admittedly oblique) point about Parker is I suspect he got it wrong lowering his score. But point taken — who cares anymore what Parker thinks/thought.
The ‘moderator’ at BWE (Bordeaux Wine Enthusiasts) is the main critic of GPL. But his objectivity on the subject is in serious doubt, he’s made GPL one of his whipping boys and that seems more important than a fair tasting of what’s in the bottle.
But if his criticisms are taken a face value, he complains that GPL is boring, overrated, foursquare, and lacks terroir.
It’s funny; we bitch when a wine doesn’t express the vintage, then bitch when some vintages aren’t masculine or feminine or saline enough. For my money, this wine is reliably good, sometimes much better than that and usually a bargain for its price.
The 2000 lynch is the real deal too. I’ve sort of given up on this wine because it is almost never the value it used to be.
GPL offers the best value in Paulliac year in and year out IMO. BTW: Many Chateaux owners always add a case of that wine to their private cellars. This is no secret. So the people who dislike GPL know Bordeaux better obviously than the producers themselves.
In 1982, 1985, 1990, 1995, 1996, 2000, 2005, 2009, 2010, 2015 this wine is amongst the best Medocs. I would be very interested to see results in Blind Tastings with GPL and all the First and Second Growth included. It is a safe bet to say that GPL won’t be at the bottom of the list.
Those who think the expensive cult wines are always superior are in need of more blind tasting experiences.
I’m still giggling about picking up a bunch of the GPL 2014 for $50 each.
Jurgen is right, GPL is a solid classic. And always seems to do very well in the years many critics do not consider the blockbusters, think 2004 and 2001, for example.