Bordeaux 10 years on tasting: Left Bank 2010 reds Jane Anson

After their first decade, it’s the perfect time for a thorough assessment of Bordeaux reds from one of the great vintages of the modern era. Jane Anson revisited the wines at a London tasting, and the following pages reflect her thoughts on 40 great wines

If only every ‘10 years on’ tasting were as good at this. The kind where the wines are living up to already high expectations, and where your memory of them as fledgling samples a decade ago is still so fresh that you are just thrilled to check in on old friends to see how they are getting on.

It doesn’t seem so long ago that I was sitting in my tiny town garden, at the end of the 2010 en primeur week, writing about the architectural nature of the vintage on what was at the time my personal blog. Tasting the 2010s when they were still in barrel was an exercise in endurance at times. You had to grapple with width, depth, angles, walls, floors, trying to work out what was what and which elements were going to end up on top. A crash-course in the interplay of tannins and acidity, and the many different ways in which they can strengthen or strangle a wine, and how much depth and sheer quality of fruit is needed in this kind of vintage to stand up to the overpowering presence of those other two elements.

Checking back in on the 2010s during the horizontal tasting in London was always going to be fascinating. I knew I was going to find some great wines, but I was worried that too many would continue to be about endurance rather than enjoyment. I was almost certain that 10 years would not have been enough to soften the wines, and that we would be drumming our fingers and scratching our heads working out when they could be approached.

Outstanding wines

And yet where a year ago tasting the 2009s at the 10-year mark had surprised me by their brilliance, the 2010s ended up doing far more than simply living up to my expectations. There was less of the exuberant fun of retasting the 2009s – fewer present exchanged smiles or shared recognition as we made our way through the line-up at BI Wines & Spirits – but there were many wow-moments all the same.

For me, they did what the 2010s have always had the capacity to do – slowly but surely convince you that these are some of the best wines Bordeaux has ever produced. I have never given so many high scores in any tasting – of the 59 wines in the whole tasting (compared to 67 in the 2009 line-up), I gave 100 points to five, one more than last year and five more than for the 2008s, along with two 99s and eight 98s. And this is not en primeur; this is in bottle after 10 years when you can feel utterly confident that what is good now has proved its worth.

I would still say that 2009 is the vintage that will win more friends, certainly if you are drinking it any time soon. They are brilliant wines that took my breath away last year, and that showed how terroir signature comes through after 10 years, even in vintages like 2009 that were so appealing and fruit-driven when young. But the 2010 manages to take that brilliance and build on it, and will just keep on delivering time and again over the next two, three, four or more decades. The best examples are unimpeachable, if we are allowed to use that phrase right now.

Vintage recap

Outstanding weather in 2010 delivered wines from across Bordeaux that combined high tannins, high acidity and high alcohol, and it’s a year that one day is likely to genuinely compete for the title ‘vintage of the century’. From July to September, only 50mm of rain fell across the region, making it the driest summer of the decade: more so than 2005 and 2009 during the same period. Merlot harvest began 21 September, Cabernets early October, so similar to 2009, but lasting longer.

Jane Anson is a Decanter contributing editor and the DWWA Regional Chair for Bordeaux. She lives in the region, and her book titles include the newly published Inside Bordeaux (£60, BB&R Press, April 2020), an in- depth study of the region, and Bordeaux Legends, a history of the 1855 first growth wines (Abrams 2013)

‘This is the first time I have ever given three perfect scores to the three Pauillac first growths’

Jane Anson tasting at Château Cos d’Estournel in St-Estèphe the clear personality differences between them, will need at least 15 or 20 years in bottle before beginning to soften, and it stands as a reminder of how exceptional are the pieces of land they are found on.

Best appellations

Although the tasting was packed full of delightful wines, one appellation stood out for me: Pauillac. At times it seemed as if this northern powerhouse was delivering a line-up of greatest hits. St-Julien was close behind, but my money would go on the gravels of Pauillac in this most late-ripening of years – and this is the first time I have ever given three perfect scores to the three Pauillac firsts. Where three of my four 100pts in 2009 were on the Right Bank, in 2010 none were – in fact, all were in Pauillac or St-Julien. We tasted less from Pessac-Léognan, but on the whole these also showed great consistency. I found very few wines with faults – 2010 was a year that was constructed so well, and also had such high levels of acidity, that most wines have been well protected against deviation and spoilage.

Pricing

The Achilles heel of 2010. The average price point, according to Liv-ex in 2017, was €250 per bottle ex-Bordeaux, compared to €225 for the 2009s, and €76 for the 2008s. And you’ll know that many of the top wines, notably the ones with the biggest price rises, were unable to maintain these prices – famously Château Lafite Rothschild, which was released into the fever of the Asian market, and was initially offered at as much as £12,000 per dozen (for the third tranche). In March 2020, merchants were offering it from about £7,500 in bond, up from its low point of £5,500 in 2015.

When you look more closely, a lot of the 2010 vintage’s questionable reputation on the secondary market has come from the performance of the first growths and the super-seconds. Overall today, the rest of the 2010 classified red wines have risen in price.

Nota bene...

Bordeaux is still very much vintage-led, no matter how many advances have been made in viticulture to help with more challenging years. This raft of high scores for the 2010s might lull you into a false sense of security that Bordeaux always tastes like this. It doesn’t: vintages of this kind, given the five-star nod at the time, don’t come along very often.

These are wines in which the depth and width of tannins encircles the fruit effortlessly. It is so blindingly obvious that they are well made and will age that it would be ridiculous not to recommend buying them.

and seductively. Has powerful texture and tannic architecture, and unlike the 2009 at its 10-year point, this is still keeping plenty of secrets close to its chest. But you are going to want to be around when it fully opens. Drink 2022-2050 Alc 13.5%

Château Mouton Rothschild, Pauillac 1CC 100

£465 (ib)-£ 1,038.33 Cadman Fine Wines, Farr Vintners, Millésima, Montrachet, Private Cellar Smoky grilled nose, tar. Feels very 2010 and supremely Mouton: accomplished and confident. A more glamorous, enticing edge than the other Pauillac firsts at this 10-year window. The plentiful tannins are lined with air, and the overall feel is of plush, plumped fruits, like being rolled-up in luxurious sheets. Nuanced, clever and surprising. Drink 2025-2050 Alc 13.5%

Château Pichon Longueville Comtesse de Lalande, Pauillac 2CC 100 £ 208.33-£ 285 Amathus Drinks, Frazier’s, Millésima, Montrachet

Silky, sweet black fruit, black olive and truffle. Majestically impressive, it sparks to life in your mouth. The texture is liquid silk, slowly but surely building, gaining in confidence and totally delightful. This is getting better as it ages, starting to rival the 1982 at Comtesse, and I can’t wait to keep tasting it over the decades to come. Drink 2022-2050 Alc 14%

Château Margaux, Margaux 1CC 99 £483.33-£928.33 Atlas Fine Wines, BI Wines & Spirits, Corney & Barrow, Cru, Fine & Rare, Grand Vin, Millésima, Montrachet, Monty Wines, Seckford Wines, VinQuinn

Elegant and sculpted, with concentration

fruit, truffles, olives and smoked earth: totally wonderful. You can set this back down in your cellar and feel utterly confident. Drink 2022-2050 Alc 14.5%

Château Léoville Barton, St-Julien 2CC 97

£83.33 (ib)-£ 104 Armit, Cru, Dunell’s, Fine & Rare, Justerini & Brooks, Lay & Wheeler, Private Cellar, My Wine Cellar

Love the depth and the power of this: it grips the walls of the glass. These tannins are muscular yet ready to roll, and still so powerful that you can’t help but smile.

The cassis fruits are concentrated and layered with tobacco, slate, pencil lead and smoked earth. Drink 2020-2042 Alc 13%

Château Léoville Poyferré, St-Julien 2CC 97

£84.92 (ib)-£ 201.67 Corkr, Corney & Barrow, Farr Vintners, Fine & Rare, Four Walls, Goedhuis & Co, Grand Vin, House of Townend, Justerini & Brooks, Latimer Vintners, Millésima, Montrachet, Nemo Wine Cellars, Private Cellar, VinQuinn Rich and round with cinnamon, anise and black pepper. Luxuriously silky texture, very much the signature of the property, sitting perfectly against the fresh kick of the vintage. One of the few 2010s that has maintained its violet edging around the rim of the glass, suggesting that it has decades ahead. Drink 2020-2042 Alc 14%

Château Lynch- Bages, Pauillac 5CC 97

£ 116 (ib)-£ 215 Berry Bros Exchange, BI, Corking Wines, Corkr, Cru, Fine & Rare, Frazier’s, Goedhuis & Co, Grand Vin, Millésima, My Wine Cellar, Robert Rolls, The Vinorium, Veblen Wine A majestic Pauillac, to be savoured. The