Barrels & Bottles Wine Blog

I enjoyed a fine Magnum of Tour de By Medoc cru Bourgeois 1997 with the Christmas festivities. The interesting thing was that we expected the wine to be quite forward but when first open the wine was quite closed and youthful.

As each glass went from the Magnum, the wine became softer and rounding off the bottle on Boxing day it was absolutely as smooth as silk. It made me think about the other magnums of Tour de By that I have in the cellar, especially the 2005 that I had been thinking would drink well by the 10 year mark. I have scheduled this back to 2020 now, as the wine is so big, it would be a shame to spoil it by drinking it too young.

It got me thinking about how people decide to drink their wines at the optimum time. The vast majority drink wines too young, but many wait until it is too late. My advice is to check the core to rim comparison and make sure there is some colour differentiation between the two aspects. Also check the nose. If it is still closed, give the wine another couple of years at least before rechecking.

If it is too young, leave it to stand for 48 hours open. This will lead it to come forward by about 2 years, making it much softer to the palate.

Andrew Coghlan

Labels: bordeaux, wine