Michel Bettane and Thierry Desseauve: Tasted at the château. Again this year Mouton has probably produced the most formally perfect wine in the whole of the Médoc. This perfection is first that of its texture, with a magical integration of wood, which lends to the great cedar and cigar flavors of its Cabernet a delicacy and finely nuanced complexity that one finds nowhere else, but above all there is a length and magisterial purity on the end finish. Adequately to convey this formal perfection we need to reach for musical analogies: quite simply, the timbre of this Mouton has greater harmonic richness than any of the others. It is also the lowest production of grand vin in the châteaux’s recent history! 19/19.5

Michael Schuster: Black red; dense, spicy, ripe blackcurrant nose; effortless balance, concentrated, medium-full wine, beautifully textured with the silky rich tannins of the best of the year; mouthcoating ripe fruit, fresh, sapid, complex and gratifying; a most seductively classy claret. 2017–30+. 18.5