2008 Château Pontet-Canet, Pauillac, Bordeaux

2008 Château Pontet-Canet, Pauillac, Bordeaux

Product: 20088007342
Prices start from £730.00 per case Buying options
2008 Château Pontet-Canet, Pauillac, Bordeaux

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Available by the case In Bond. Pricing excludes duty and VAT, which must be paid separately before delivery. Storage charges apply.
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12 x 75cl bottle
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Description

Ch Pontet-Canet is still finding its way along the thorny path of biodynamic viticulture but in 2008 owner Alfred Tesseron was able to make a 100% biodynamic wine. Very attractive, this is full of creamy, blackcurrant fruit with grainy, ripe tannins and generous weight. Layers of fruit swell across the palate whilst the finish is refreshing and full of concentrated fruit with a touch of spice. If not quite as incredible as the 2007, this would nonetheless be a worthy addition to any cellar Expressive dark fruit and sweet citrus freshness. Deep and mouthfilling, deep pile tannins, finishing fresh and satisfying. Plenty of freshness on the finish.
Julia Harding MW - jancisrobinson.com - Apr 09

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Critics reviews

Wine Advocate96/100
A candidate for the wine of the vintage, Pontet Canets 2008 boasts an opaque purple color as well as copious aromas of sweet blueberries, blackberries and black currant fruit intertwined with lead pencil shavings, subtle barbecue smoke and a hint of forest floor. Full-bodied, with fabulous richness, texture and tremendous freshness, this first-growth-like effort is more developed than the uber-powerful 2010. Give it 5-8 years of cellaring and drink it over the following three decades. Bravo!
Robert M. Parker, Jr. - 02/05/2011 Read more
Jancis Robinson MW17/20
Expressive dark fruit and sweet citrus freshness. Deep and mouthfilling, deep pile tannins, finishing fresh and satisfying. Plenty of freshness on the finish.
Julia Harding MW - jancisrobinson.com - Apr 09 Read more
Wine Spectator90-93/100
Very dark and brilliant in color, showing wonderful pure fruit, with crushed blackberry, currant and fresh-cut flowers. Full-bodied, with ultrafine tannins and a long, crisp, fruity finish. This offers impressive finesse and length.
James Suckling - Wine Spectator - Apr-2009 Read more
Robert Parker96/100
A candidate for the “wine of the vintage,” Pontet Canet’s 2008 boasts an opaque purple color as well as copious aromas of sweet blueberries, blackberries and black currant fruit intertwined with lead pencil shavings, subtle barbecue smoke and a hint of forest floor. Full-bodied, with fabulous richness, texture and tremendous freshness, this first-growth-like effort is more developed than the uber-powerful 2010. Give it 5-8 years of cellaring and drink it over the following three decades. Bravo!
Robert Parker- Wine Advocate- May 2011

Nobody in Bordeaux is more attentive to detail than Alfred Tesseron is at Pontet-Canet. Fashioned from incredibly low yields, a very late harvest, and a Draconian selection, the 2008 will not be close to drinkability for at least a decade... An absolutely amazing effort, it boasts an extraordinary bouquet of creme de cassis, graphite, charcoal, and incense, blockbuster depth, and full-bodied power. The tannins are high, but they are remarkably velvety. Sensational acidity gives the wine precision and vibrancy, but the impression is one of massive concentration and power. The 2008 Pontet-Canet, a candidate for the wine of the vintage, is a tour de force in viticultural precision and winemaking savoir faire.
Robert Parker- Wine Advocate - Apr 09 Read more
Decanter18/20
Black-red, finely concentrated blackcurrants nose, really fine depth of fruit on the palate, a wine with both power and breed, very expressive, masses of fruit, concentration and potentially complex flavours, while retaining totally focussed vineyard fruit. Very good wine.
Decanter - Apr-2009 Read more

About this WINE

Chateau Pontet-Canet

Chateau Pontet-Canet

Château Pontet-Canet is a large Pauillac estate that can trace its origins back to 1725, when Jean-François Pontet gave his name to the estate he had acquired. The wine was not château-bottled until 1972 and in 1975 the property was sold to Guy Tesseron, of the Tesseron family, one of the finest exponents of luxury, very old, aged Cognacs (Cognac Tesseron).

The Tesserons also own Château Lafon-Rochet in St-Estephe. Today, Château Pontet-Canet is owned and run by Alfred and Michel Tesseron.

Pontet-Canet's 78 hectares of vineyards adjoin those of Mouton Rothschild and are planted with Cabernet Sauvignon (63%), Merlot (32%) and Cabernet Franc  (5%).

The Tesserons have vastly improved the quality of the Pontet-Canet wines which are now full-bodied and packed with ripe, chewy, black fruits and finely integrated tannins. The wines posseses marvellous ageing potential.

Pontet-Canet is classified as a 5ème Cru Classé.

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Pauillac

Pauillac

Pauillac is the aristocrat of the Médoc boasting boasting 75 percent of the region’s First Growths and with Grand Cru Classés representing 84 percent of Pauillac's production.

For a small town, surrounded by so many familiar and regal names, Pauillac imparts a slightly seedy impression. There are no grand hotels or restaurants – with the honourable exception of the establishments owned by Jean-Michel Cazes – rather a small port and yacht harbour, and a dominant petrochemical plant.

Yet outside the town, , there is arguably the greatest concentration of fabulous vineyards throughout all Bordeaux, including three of the five First Growths. Bordering St Estèphe to the north and St Julien to the south, Pauillac has fine, deep gravel soils with important iron and marl deposits, and a subtle, softly-rolling landscape, cut by a series of small streams running into the Gironde. The vineyards are located on two gravel-rich plateaux, one to the northwest of the town of Pauillac and the other to the south, with the vines reaching a greater depth than anywhere else in the Médoc.

Pauillac's first growths each have their own unique characteristics; Lafite Rothschild, tucked in the northern part of Pauillac on the St Estèphe border, produces Pauillac's most aromatically complex and subtly-flavoured wine. Mouton Rothschild's vineyards lie on a well-drained gravel ridge and - with its high percentage of Cabernet Sauvignon - can produce (in its best years) Pauillac's most decadently rich, fleshy and exotic wine.

Latour, arguably Bordeaux's most consistent First Growth, is located in southern Pauillac next to St Julien. Its soil is gravel-rich with superb drainage, and Latour's vines penetrate as far as five metres into the soil. It produces perhaps the most long-lived wines of the Médoc.

Recommended Châteaux
Ch. Lafite-Rothschild, Ch. Latour, Ch. Mouton-Rothschild, Ch. Pichon-Longueville Baron, Ch. Pichon Longueville Comtesse de Lalande, Ch. Lynch-Bages, Ch. Grand-Puy-Lacoste, Ch, Pontet-Canet, Les Forts de Latour, Ch. Haut-Batailley, Ch. Batailley, Ch. Haut-Bages Libéral.

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Cabernet Sauvignon blend

Cabernet Sauvignon blend

Cabernet Sauvignon lends itself particularly well in blends with Merlot. This is actually the archetypal Bordeaux blend, though in different proportions in the sub-regions and sometimes topped up with Cabernet Franc, Malbec, and Petit Verdot.

In the Médoc and Graves the percentage of Cabernet Sauvignon in the blend can range from 95% (Mouton-Rothschild) to as low as 40%. It is particularly suited to the dry, warm, free- draining, gravel-rich soils and is responsible for the redolent cassis characteristics as well as the depth of colour, tannic structure and pronounced acidity of Médoc wines. However 100% Cabernet Sauvignon wines can be slightly hollow-tasting in the middle palate and Merlot with its generous, fleshy fruit flavours acts as a perfect foil by filling in this cavity.

In St-Emilion and Pomerol, the blends are Merlot dominated as Cabernet Sauvignon can struggle to ripen there - when it is included, it adds structure and body to the wine. Sassicaia is the most famous Bordeaux blend in Italy and has spawned many imitations, whereby the blend is now firmly established in the New World and particularly in California and  Australia.

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When is a wine ready to drink?

We provide drinking windows for all our wines. Alongside the drinking windows there is a bottle icon and a maturity stage. Bear in mind that the best time to drink a wine does also depend on your taste.

Not ready

These wines are very young. Whilst they're likely to have lots of intense flavours, their acidity or tannins may make them feel austere. Although it isn't "wrong" to drink these wines now, you are likely to miss out on a lot of complexity by not waiting for them to mature.

Ready - youthful

These wines are likely to have plenty of fruit flavours still and, for red wines, the tannins may well be quite noticeable. For those who prefer younger, fruitier wines, or if serving alongside a robust meal, these will be very enjoyable. If you choose to hold onto these wines, the fruit flavours will evolve into more savoury complexity.

Ready - at best

These wines are likely to have a beautiful balance of fruit, spice and savoury flavours. The acidity and tannins will have softened somewhat, and the wines will show plenty of complexity. For many, this is seen as the ideal time to drink and enjoy these wines. If you choose to hold onto these wines, they will become more savoury but not necessarily more complex.

Ready - mature

These wines are likely to have plenty of complexity, but the fruit flavours will have been almost completely replaced by savoury and spice notes. These wines may have a beautiful texture at this stage of maturity. There is lots to enjoy when drinking wines at this stage. Most of these wines will hold in this window for a few years, though at the very end of this drinking window, wines start to lose complexity and decline.