Hindsight and hearsay are easily banished when one is faced with nearly 200 glasses of wine from the Bordeaux 2020 vintage (not all, despite the brilliance of the World of Fine Wine team, poured at the same time). My deep dive into the en primeur whirligig only started properly with the 2021 vintage, so I am approaching these youthful specimens from 2020 with curiosity, unsure hitherto of the validity or otherwise of the “reputation” of the vintage.
Warm but not hot; drought but no water stress; precocious yet classic—the usual joyous litany of contradictions… which either means that no one agrees or that no one has yet decided. All eminently reasonable, one may say, given the category in question.
I was anticipating rich, strident wines, more in the mold of 2018 than, say, 2016. As it turned out, I think that the latter exemplar bears better comparison, although many of the wines were (understandably) somewhat closed, some of them downright reticent.
I was also anticipating a Right Bank triumph, because of the difficult arrière-saison and its knock-on effects (or so we were advised) on the ripening of the Cabernet Sauvignon. Yet many of the wines that stood out were, in fact, from the Left Bank and therefore Cabernet-rich. Palmarès run up and down the region: A terrific Fieuzal (albeit not quite in the league of La Mission Haut-Brion) in Péssac set the pace, to be followed in rapid succession by totems from each key commune.
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Primi inter pares: Cos, Gruaud-Larose, Pichon Lalande, and Palmer. The Pichon Lalande, for example, edged the Baron in Pauillac and underlined the personality of some of the most successful of the Left Bankers: sappy, supple, finely grained tannins; upstanding, authoritative acidity; generous but not overbearing fruit; and an overall harmony rich in allusive potential. Not in the least hot or flustered… or overblown. Both Cos and Gruaud-Larose dazzled the intellect; intimations of Calvinist austerity and gravelly rigor tempered by teasing ripeness and a lack of excess or caricature.
Showing its true colors
The Bordeaux 2020 vintage, first touted as one of the “warm” ones, now starts to show its true colors; nuance and complexity will out over the medium term. Maybe less so than the excellent 2019s, but not as far removed stylistically as one might originally have expected. Three things support the optimism: the long hang-time (120 days rather than the traditional 100); the timely mid-August precipitation, which tempered inclinations to balmy excess; and the diurnal temperature variations, which are less evident in the genuine canicule years. Only the slightly troubled second half of the harvest might be perceived as a source of complication. All is to play for…
Less so for the Sauternes, which were almost universally disappointing. The botrytic episodes were fragmented and parsimonious, characteristics that inform many of the wines, too. Maybe a good time to have a look at some of those 2014s!
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Fascinating, overall—how could it not be? Despite the early adolescent posturing, many of the wines celebrate their terroir with dignity. A beautifully aromatic, silky Giscours and a precise, thought-provoking Montrose are but two that stand out. This was more evident, to me anyway, on the Left Bank. Some of the Right Bankers presented transitional, troubled faces; fruit character and latent complexity (not to mention sheer generosity of spirit) somewhat unforthcoming. A function of youth, maybe, and it was not without significance that some of the second wines (Petit Cheval and Les Pensées de Lafleur two obvious examples) were more communicative than the grands vins on the day. This, one may argue, is as it should have been.
Simon Field MW’s top Bordeaux 2020 wines
Château La Mission Haut-Brion 97
Château Palmer 97
Château Pichon Longueville Comtesse de Lalande 97
Château Cos d’Estournel 96
Château Gruaud-Larose 96
Château Cheval Blanc 95
Château La Fleur-Pétrus 95
Château Pichon Baron 95
Alter Ego 94
Château Branaire-Ducru 94
Château Calon Ségur 94
Château Canon 94
Château de Fieuzal 94
Château Giscours 94
Château Hosanna 94
Château Lafleur 94
Château Léoville Barton 94
Château Léoville Poyferré 94
Château Montrose 94
Château Phélan Ségur 94
Les Pensées de Lafleur 94
Les Perrières de Lafleur 94
Château Troplong Mondot 94
