Château Pichon-Longueville Comtesse de Lalande 2009

Seductive tea and herbal aromatics, herbaceous tannins, a lean, easy-drinking structure—pure pleasure.

A beautiful effort, the 2009 Pichon Lalande, a blend of 75% Cabernet Sauvignon, 20% Merlot and 5% Petit Verdot, possesses copious mocha, lead pencil, unsmoked, high-class tobacco, black currant, forest floor and herbaceous characteristics. It is a deep purple-hued, charming, surprisingly open-knit Pauillac with wonderful freshness, a plump, fleshy mouthfeel, opulence and unctuosity, medium to full body and a well-delineated, luscious style. More elegant than its nearby neighbor, Pichon Longueville Baron, and not as massive in concentration and extract, it is one of the great Pichon Lalandes of the last twenty years.

Roederer Estates had owned Pichon Comtesse for three years prior to the 2009 vintage, having taken over in 2006, with Gildas d'Ollone as managing director and Thomas Do-Chi-Nam as technical director. Together, they created a stunning, lyrical 2009 that just begs to be savoured. It’s ripe and intense, rippling with juicy blackberry and blackcurrant fruit and touches of violet on the nose. A beautifully balanced wine.

Ruby with the slightest hint of browning. Herbal nose with light, easygoing black fruit. A pretty simple, straightforward palate. Soft, submissive tannins. Doesn’t seem to have much complexity or length. Underripe. (RH)

The 2009 Pichon Lalande is ripe and decidedly flamboyant from the very first taste. Dense and voluptuous in the glass, with serious richness, the 2009 is also almost shockingly tannic. It won’t be ready to drink anytime soon, and yet, there is so much to look forward to. The warm, dry conditions yielded a dense, exotic Pichon Lalande, but there is serious structure beneath all of the fruit.

Sensuous, rich, opulent, concentrated, powerful, ripe, long, and intense, the velvet-drenched wine fills your palate with layers of dark red fruits. There are no hard edges. The wine is already so easy to drink that it’s impossible not to be seduced into finishing the bottle far too quickly. As good as this is, give it a few more years in the bottle, and it’s going to be even better as it gains in secondary nuances and complexities. Drink from 2024–2050.

Brilliant dark ruby garnet colour with purple reflections, a delicate watery rim. Light nuances of nougat and Black Forest berry confit, hints of blueberries, caramel and sweet precious wood. Juicy, sweet core, elegant texture, firm ripe tannins, very good freshness, mineral and persistent, already accessible, shows great length, with some ageing potential. Already accessible, but better to wait.

Fine oak, roasted coffee and tobacco on the nose with cassis and dark cherry notes; the palate is well balanced, rich and concentrated, with soft extraction and mellow tannins. Elegant red and dark berries on the palate, elegant and restrained, with a very long, classy aftertaste. It has length, finesse and elegance, and should gain complexity with further aging. Very stylish.

In the same qualitative ballpark as the 2010, if not a step up, the 2009 Château Pichon-Longueville Comtesse De Lalande nevertheless offers more immediate pleasure and opulence, with a gorgeous perfume of blackcurrants, lead pencil, unsmoked tobacco, truffle, and spice box. A blend of 75% Cabernet Sauvignon, 20% Merlot, and 5% Petit Verdot, this full-bodied, round, mouth-filling Pauillac has sweet tannins, beautiful mid-palate depth, and a great finish. It needs an hour or two in a decant today to drink brilliantly and will unquestionably evolve gracefully for another 20-25 years.

Deep purple-garnet, dense at the core, with a violet glimmer at the rim. Intense bouquet with notes of hazelnut, roasted coffee, prunes and dried fruits, somehow reminiscent of the 2003 vintage in a clearly more concentrated form. A mouthful of wine, almost bursting on the palate, with a richness usually sought in great Pomerol vintages, praline and coconut in the long finish. In a blind tasting, one might even mistake this Pichon-Lalande from time to time for a Mouton.

75% of the harvest was classified as Grand Vin. 75% Cabernet Sauvignon, 20% Merlot, 5% Petit Verdot. 39 hl/ha. Deep purple-garnet, dense at the core, with a violet rim. Rich, ripe bouquet of black plum and prune, coffee and a hint of bell pepper (as usual), quite a lot of Havana tobacco, plenty of volume and a touch of enticing coconut on the attack. Juicy, elegant palate, very fine tannins already integrated, perfumed vanillin within a silky-dense extract, showing a beautiful, almost dancing Cabernet freshness, great length. A feminine yet forceful Comtesse in its innate, classic style. Not a wine to gaze at reverentially in its maturity, but a Pauillac that quickly makes you want a second glass. Perhaps it will soon taste like its own ’82?! (19/20). 12: Deep purple-garnet, dense at the core, violet shimmer at the edge. Intense bouquet, hazelnut notes, coffee-roast tones, prunes and dried fruits, somehow reminiscent of the 2003 in a clearly more concentrated form. A mouthful of wine, almost bursting on the palate, with an opulence one usually seeks in great Pomerol vintages, pralines and coconut on the long finish. Perhaps this Pichon-Lalande will sometimes be mistaken for a Mouton in a blind tasting. (19/20). 19: Quite dark in the middle, clearly brightening toward the rim. The bouquet seems fairly open and rather generous. Caramel, pralines and butter dominate the first aromas, then come damson-type plums, blackcurrant candies and also red-berry nuances. On the second nose, one finds the typically greenish Pinot Noir-Co-La glint. On the palate, velvety with lots of charm. Because of its generous girth, the body is hard to define. It is the only 2009 that currently delivers unrestrained joy. So a Pauillac with sex appeal. Current rating: 18/20. 21: Medium garnet-purple, slightly lighter at the rim. Powerful, heady bouquet, damson plums, notes of spent eau-de-vie marc from plums, very expansive, quite rich with a distinct Ruby Port glint. At the moment it thus shows rather alcoholic on the attack. On the palate it moves with plenty of power and shows the vintage-typical heat and also extreme sweetness in the ample extract. For now it struggles with harmony. But perhaps it is in a somewhat unfavorable phase of evolution. It will never become classic anyway. Potential rating: 19/20 pending

No excess ripeness, and of course plenty of finesse in the tannins, but overall it lacks character and top-level personality, at least for now.

A dense, velvety attack, a beautiful velvety mid-palate, with fruit.

The nose is aromatic, elegant, powerful, concentrated (yet balanced) and very finely tight. It reveals notes of blackberry, strawberry and wild raspberry, combined with touches of terroir (gravel), a subtle hint of flower, as well as discreet touches of spices, cardamom, cinnamon, a discreet hint of pepper and an imperceptible hint of cocoa. The palate is fruity, fresh, balanced and elegant, offering a lovely mineral framework, fine acidity, tension, beautiful finesse and a fine grain. A monster of balance and elegance! On the palate, this wine expresses notes of fleshy/juicy blackberry, fleshy raspberry, berries and, more slightly, blackcurrant, combined with fine touches of gravel, a hint of mocha and a very discreet/imperceptible hint of spring flowers, tea and spices. Good length and very beautiful persistence.

Logo on the cork: AL I tasted two slightly different bottles (the first one was 17). The second showed a bit more freshness because it was less evolved. Dark color, intense and slightly evolved. Very aromatic, powerful nose. The fruit is ripe and creamy. Juicy on the attack, very hedonistic mid-palate, melting and pleasant; the wine becomes a bit easy-going between the mid-palate and the finish, with normal length. The bottle was opened and tasted the next day; its resistance to air is fragile. I recommend drinking it now.

At the top. More Cabernet-driven, it offers a superbly defined palate;

94-96 Barrel sample. There is great power here, solid, dark and firm, showing muscularity, sinewy tannins and smoky intensity.