Château La Conseillante, Pomerol, 2023
Marielle Cazaux and consultant oenologist Thomas Duclos have backed up their superb 2022 with one of the best La Conseillantes we can recall tasting from barrel. Typically velure and generous, but somehow brighter and more vivid, the 2023 reveals aromas of dried raspberries, crushed stones, minerals, violets and sandalwood. Layered and complex, this elegant and silky textured Pomerol glides across the palate with waves of supple, hedgerow fruit, cool spice and crushed gravel. There's real depth here with lots of layers supported by silky tannins laced with bright berries. This is a suave, vibrant and expressive Conseillante packed with fragrant fruits and a long, lingering, detailed finish. Gorgeous. A blend of 88% Merlot and 12% Cabernet Franc, 30% aged in amphorae.
critic reviews
Just as it was from cask, the 2023 La Conseillante is one of the vintage's most exciting wines in bottle. Offering up lavish aromas of ripe blackberries and mulberries mingled with hints of violets and mint, it's medium- to full-bodied, supple and fleshy, with an ample core of fruit, beautifully refined tannins and a long, perfumed finish. Readers who own both the deeper-pitched, elegantly muscular 2022 and the utterly charming, hedonistic 2023 will enjoy comparing and contrasting the two over the decades to come. The 2023 is a blend of 88% Merlot and 12% Cabernet Franc, some 30% of which is maturing in amphorae. Harvest began on September 7, lasting until October 2, block by block.
The 2023 La Conseillante had been bottled in May. This certainly benefitted from a few minutes' aeration, gaining clarity with blackberry, blueberry, dried, wilted flowers and touches of crushed stone, the 12% Cabernet Franc imparting light pepperiness. The palate is medium-bodied and perhaps demonstrates a little more backbone than out of barrel. Firm grip, a touch of chalkiness in texture toward the finish, with a very long finish. This delivers.
Deep garnet-purple in color, the 2023 La Conseillante pounces from the glass with playful scents of Morello cherries, wild blueberries, and juicy plums leading to fragrant suggestions of violets, dark chocolate, rosebud tea, and star anise. The medium-bodied palate is wonderfully elegant and graceful, with super-sleek kitten-soft tannins and spectacular tension that delivers an electric feel, although the finish purrs. 85% of this year's crop went in to the First Wine, a blend of 88% Merlot and 12% Cabernet Franc with pH 3.68.
A punch of floral aromatics sets the scene for this gorgeous wine, and this is a brillant La Conseillante with textured powerful depths to the blueberry and blackberry fruit, laced with cocoa bean and espresso, and a fame of juicy tannins on the giving structure and lift. Easily among the most successful wines of Pomerol in the vintage. Started picking September 7 and finished October 2. 3.6ph. 3% of amphora, 43hl/h yield. 70% aged in new oak. Marielle Cazeaux director.