Château Palmer
Alter Ego de Château Palmer, Margaux, 2022
93/100
Inside Bordeaux
91-93/100
Robert Parker Wine Advocate
92/100
The Wine Independent
92/100
Vinous
Available Vintages
portfolio
2022
6x75cl
DP
£503.14
Last Few
2022
6x75cl
DP
£503.14
Justerini & Brooks Tasting note
Made from a blend of 51% Cabernet Sauvignon, 43% Merlot and 6% Petit Verdot from the lighter gravel and sandy soils at Palmer. Contrary to conventional wisdom, the team here decided not to do soft extractions. They wanted to build a backbone so elected to go deep with their macerations. The result is dark and sultry Alter Ego with notes of liqueur fruits, brioche, graphite, bramble and plums. There's a lot of attack and some good definition, but it perhaps lacks the spark and energy of the vintage's most successful wines.
delivery information
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DELIVERY
How much is delivery
Delivery is free to mainland Great Britain and other bonded warehouses for orders over £200 (inc. VAT) in value. For orders under the value of £200 destined for mainland Great Britain there is a delivery charge of £18 (inc. VAT).
All deliveries to mainland Great Britain coming from Cellarers will incur a delivery charge of £24 (inc. VAT). Cellarers Storage Charges.
Where are the wines stored and are they fully insured whilst in storage?
We store clients’ wines with a subsidiary company called Cellarers (Wines) Ltd, which is wholly owned by Justerini & Brooks but where clients’ wines are segregated from our own stock. The wines are stored at Octavian's industry-leading underground cellars in Corsham, Wiltshire, UK. All wines stored with Cellarers are individually labelled with clients’ details and are insured to current market value.
Can I ship outside of mainland Great Britain?
We offer regular shipments to Hong Kong from £90 per 9L case and £62 per 4.5L case. A discounted rate of £72 per 9L case may apply when shipping five or more cases to one address. Deliveries usually take approximately three weeks.
For deliveries to destinations other than mainland Great Britain or Hong Kong, please contact the Customer Relationship Team via email on justbrooksorders@justerinis.com for a quote.
Why can’t I request delivery of certain wines?
Most often, the reason you cannot request delivery of certain wines is that they are still ‘En Primeur’ and not yet in the country. Once they land in the UK, they will be available for Duty Paid Delivery. Click here for more information on buying En Primeur.
GUARANTEED PROVENANCE
Provenance in fine wine
When it comes to purchasing wine, provenance is of upmost importance. A wine’s history – where it’s sourced from and how it’s been stored – can have an enormous influence on the eventual enjoyment it provides. At Justerini & Brooks, we can trace nearly every case back to the domaine, estate or Château it originally came from; we ship from over 200 wine producers throughout the world.
Wines not bought directly from the vineyard are either sourced from trusted suppliers, with whom we share the same philosophy and rigour in buying, or from our own network of Cellarers customers. These customers’ wines are stored in optimal conditions in Octavian Corsham and, in the vast majority of cases, have been stored by us since the wine was first shipped. We do not purchase wine from auctions.
We feel it is equally important to for our customers that the case they buy and leave in storage with us is exactly the same case they subsequently have delivered. This may sound obvious and straightforward, yet we are one of very few merchants to have taken measures to ensure this.
We have created a system where every case is independent, thereby ensuring a trail of ownership and peace of mind for every customer.
The Journey
Justerinis ensures that every case of wine stored with Cellarers (Wines) Ltd has a unique identifier and customer’s name, almost unheard of in the industry as it is expensive to administer. These details are printed and placed on every case which is logged and recorded under your account name and kept in the world’s most renowned storage facility, Octavian Corsham.
This information is sent from our systems to the warehouse every day to ensure the trail of ownership is verified and upheld.
While customer reserves are stored in Corsham, our physical stocks are kept in Hoddesdon, further providing a geographical separation between customers’ wines with Cellarers and Justerinis’ own stock.
Further Reassurance
Cellarers (Wines) Ltd is a legally separate limited company from Justerini & Brooks which currently holds approximately £450 million worth of customer reserves. It is fully insured to catastrophic loss. Many merchants will state that wine in their care is fully insured, but in reality this is on an individual case basis with insufficient cover for total loss as this is prohibitively expensive. The cover provided by Octavian and Justerini & Brooks is unmatched.
Cellarers (Wines) Ltd is audited by PwC every year.
Critic Reviews
92/100
Chris Kissack,
The Wine Independent
Alter Ego is 51% Merlot, 43% Cabernet Sauvignon and 6% Petit Verdot, almost a mirror image of the grand vin, the blend as always determined by soil more than selection. This takes a little less than 30% of the crop. The élevage for the second wine is around 30% new oak, passing the first year in barrel, the second year in foudre. A beautiful concentration on the nose here, introducing some dried-fruit elements to the mix, with elements of confit cherry and raspberry, currant too, with a rose petal note, very Margaux in style, but with Palmer intensity amplified by the dry concentrating effect of the vintage. A very solid, composed, polished style on the palate, relaxing just a touch in the middle to reveal layers of dried summer berries and dark chocolate, with firm, dusty, powdery tannins intertwined, leaving the finish coated in fine but dry tannins. I can see this evolving in a very confident fashion, although I would have liked a little more freshness in the fruit profile. The alcohol on the label is 14%.
drinking window 2026 - 2042
date of review 06/2025
93/100
Jane Anson,
Inside Bordeaux
Damson plum colour, intense, concentrated and spicy, with the lightness of touch coming in through the floral aromatics, and a lift of white pepper and sage spices. Big punch of fig and blackberry fruit, and a tight umi plum edge that provides contrast. Deft and skilful, great quality. Harvest September 7 to October 5, yield 23hl/h. Thomas Duroux director. First year in barrels and then into larger oak casks for the rest of ageing.
drinking window 2028 - 2040
date of review 03/2025
92/100
Neal Martin,
Vinous
The 2022 Alter Ego, bottled in late July, has a clean and precise bouquet, with touches of violet infusing the black fruit and a nose that you could describe as "cool, calm and collected." The palate is medium-bodied, stricter and more linear than expected, partly due to recent bottling. There is intensity here, a crisp texture and a very graphite-driven finish that lends it a Pauillac-like personality.
drinking window 2027 - 2050
date of review 02/2025
91-93/100
William Kelley,
Robert Parker Wine Advocate
A blend of 51% Cabernet Sauvignon, 43% Merlot and 6% Petit Verdot, the 2022 Alter Ego de Palmer offers up aromas of cherries, wild berries and plums mingled with vine smoke and rose petals. Medium to full-bodied, deep and brooding, with a layered core of fruit, lively acids and rich, powdery tannins, it's a gourmand, voluptuous wine that will offer a broad drinking window.
date of review 04/2023
product details
Specifications
allergen information
This product may contain sulphites. Full allergen information is available upon request, please call our Customer Relations Team on +44 (0)20 7484 6430.
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