2012 Château Troplong Mondot, St Emilion, Bordeaux

Olive, cassis, black cherry, leathery and cedar – this is classic claret with so much to love. It has crunch in both acid and tannin – and fruit, in fact. Beautifully open and persistent. Almost as good as their 2010, but much more ready for drinking now. 

Drink 2022 - 2037

Well-toasted, with coffee and ganache notes coating the core of crushed plum and blackberry fruit. Keeps a hefty feel through the finish, with the ganache edge dominating. Lacks the taut feel of the vintage, pulling off the powerful style with aplomb.

One of the deepest colours. Rich, ripe and intense on the nose. Suave and plush on the palate. Powerful but finely etched tannins. Modern but within bounds.

Drink 2019 - 2030

The 2012 Troplong Mondot has a fragrant bouquet with black cherry, cough candy and touches of marmalade, not complex but vigorous and fresh. The palate is medium-bodied with a fine bone structure and good acidity. Some expressive Cabernet Franc lends a Left Bank tincture to the spicy, black pepper-tinged finish. Classy, but not sure about its longevity. Tasted twice at Bordeaux Index's Ten Year-On tasting and blind at the Southwold Ten-Year On tasting.

Drink 2022 - 2032

90% Merlot and 10% Cabernet Sauvignon; 14.3% alcohol; 31 hectoliters per hectare; roughly 75% of the total production went into the grand vin.

Inky purple. Ripe aromas of cassis, stewed plum, dark cocoa, coffee and fresh herbs on the showy nose. On the palate, more ripe dark fruit and chocolate flavours are complicated by vanilla and coffee notes. This very powerful wine comes across as rich and velvety and finishes with a trace of alcoholic heat. It will be appreciated more by fans of high-pH, internationally-styled wines than by Bordeaux classicists.

One of the clear wines of the vintage, the 2012 Troplong-Mondot has been remarkable on several occasions. Sweet crushed flowers, red cherries, smoke, tobacco and plums open up in a heady, sensual Saint-Emilion that hits all the right notes. The 2012 blossoms nicely with time in the glass, gaining volume, but never losing its precision. This head-turning, flashy Saint-Emilion will delight readers for the next two decades, perhaps longer. What a gorgeous wine this is. Sadly, proprietor Christine Valette passed away in the spring of 2013, but her legacy will remain alive for quite some time with wines like this.

Drink 2020 - 2032

Their 63-acre vineyard was cropped at 31 hectoliters per hectare, producing a final blend of 90% Merlot and 10% Cabernet Sauvignon that achieved 14.2% alcohol.

The 2012 is another truly great wine from Troplong Mondot. It’s always sentimental to taste this wine, realizing that proprietress Christine Valette the larger-than-life heart and soul behind this estate) has passed away. She was one of the bright, shining stars of Bordeaux. Nevertheless, her legacy is certainly well-established, and the quality of this wine is beyond reproach. Inky bluish purple, its great notes of cassis, blackberry, and liquorice are followed by a full-bodied, opulently textured wine with stunning concentration, purity and overall balance. It should drink well for 20-25 years and turn out to be one of the great superstars of 2012.

Drink 2015 - 2040

A flat-out gorgeous wine in the vintage is the 2012 Troplong Mondot, which sports an inky ruby/purple colour to go with heavenly notes of black currants, smoked earth, plums, liquorice and graphite. Full-bodied, seamless, ultra-pure and impressively concentrated, this blockbuster effort needs 3-4 years in the cellar to let the tannins integrate, and it will knock your socks off over the following two decades.

Drink 2020 - 2040