Château Margaux 2005

VINUM 6/2006 - Once again, an absolute masterpiece. The nose already shows incredible complexity with notes of rose, violet, raspberry, a remarkably dense texture, incredible elegance despite the power, a fresh, endlessly long finish – inspiration and perfection in one.

The Château Margaux 2005 has a near-perfect bouquet with brilliant precision and remarkable focus: mainly black, mineral-soaked fruit that grows more and more intense in the glass. That graphite note becomes more pronounced with aeration, lending it an almost Pauillac-like style. The palate is effortless, with sumptuous ripe tannins, perfect acidity, layers of sensual ripe red fruit, and a precise mineral finish. This is sheer class, a crystalline beauty, and the persistence is simply breathtaking.

This extraordinary wine announces its brilliance at first glance, with bright curranty fruit aromas that unfold quietly at first until one realizes the depth of concentration and flavor it possesses, with exotic spices, smoke, leather, and earth. The blend of 85% Cabernet Sauvignon and 15% Merlot, aged in new casks, delivers a silky texture, perfect balance, and enough substance to provide fantastic length without any heaviness. This wine was the unanimous favorite in the flight.

Still youthful, the wine is intensely concentrated, full, deep and rich. Aromatically, this is off the hook with its floral nature; you also find spice box, herbs, tobacco leaf, and a bushel of red and black fruits. Long, deep and intense, the fruit is sweet, ripe and fresh, finishing with vibrancy, length and purity. But time will make this a better experience, so give it at least 7 more years in the cellar and enjoy it over the next 3–4 decades after that.

Deep, dark ruby, purple reflections and subtle brightening on the rim. Very seductive on the nose with hints of cassis and wild berries, subtle notes of honey and savoury wood. Crisp and tightly knit on the palate with a firm texture, fresh acidity, dark berries and a very long finish. Definite further ageing potential.

At another level, the 2005 Château Margaux is as good as it gets, offering an incredible, full-bodied, layered style as well as the classic nuance, complexity, and elegance this Château is known for. Based on 85% Cabernet Sauvignon and 15% Merlot raised in new barrels, its still youthful ruby/purple hue is followed by a kaleidoscope-like array of cassis, smoked currants, cedar pencil, spring flowers, and graphite. With incredible concentration, a multi-dimensional, layered mouthfeel, loads of ripe yet perfectly integrated tannins, and a finish that makes you salivate, this insanely good Margaux is just now at the early stages of its prime drinking window and has another 30 years of prime drinking ahead of it. Legendary juice.

Dense garnet-purple with violet highlights. Warm and slightly alcoholic nose (like a great Priorat wine), lots of raisins, fresh bread-crust notes, tending toward red berries with herbal thyme and mint nuances. On the palate, fairly massive astringency with grainy, monstrous tannins. A Margaux with an almost impossible-to-assess aging potential.

Concentrated, complex, and profound bouquet with concentrated fruit, vanilla, butter, wild blueberries, mulberries, lilac. A concentrated, dense, multi-layered, elegant yet powerful palate with superb aromatics, dense structure, superb fruit, plenty of fine tannins, an elegant, dense, superb finish with great lingering flavors. An elegant, powerful wine. 20/20 2015 - 2040

The 2005 Chateau Margaux is a blend of 85% Cabernet Sauvignon and 15% Merlot. Deep garnet-brick in color, it reveals an earthy nose redolent of crushed rocks, tilled soil, and truffles over a kirsch and crème de cassis core with floral notes coming through. The medium- to full-bodied palate is elegant and perfumed, with soft, velvety tannins, finishing long and layered. Perfumed, layered, and approachable now, it is within its ideal drinking window and will continue to drink well through 2047. In 2003, Corinne Mentzelopoulos bought back the majority stake and became the controlling shareholder of Chateau Margaux. This 2005 was made by Paul Pontallier.

A benchmark. Deep nose, generous fruit, with a lingering touch of noble oak. Very youthful on the palate, a powerful, dense wine, yet also refined and silky. Built for ageing, with sumptuous length.

Logo on the capsule: inverted T (Trescases) Dark, intense color with slight evolution. An intense, delicate, and perfumed nose with a backdrop of exotic wood. Delicate from the attack and especially very airy mid-palate, ultra-refined in texture, rich in flavors and nuances, the wine unfolds juicy, noble, and deep toward a very long, complex finish. The presence of the 2009 that follows will highlight a livelier final nuance, but how good and grand it is! It’s not ready yet. Above all, don’t serve it alongside the 2009. Its incomparable smoothness is overshadowed.

85% Cabernet Sauvignon, 8% Merlot, 6% Petit Verdot, 1% Cabernet Franc. 42 hl/ha over the entire harvest (thus including Pavillon Rouge and a third declassification). Production: approx. 180,000 bottles. Deep purple, violet with a lilac sheen. Deep, spicy bouquet, lots of blue berries; the fruit seems to move more in the background and the wine draws its power from depth: tar, cassis, mulberries, truffle; it already smells almost more like Pauillac than Margaux, a profile never before encountered as a barrel sample; dark Baccara roses, floral freshness, showing more terroir than fruit. On the palate, tremendous power, firm, dense yet already well-shaped astringency; everything plays in the blue-to-black berry register, yet freshness remains; massive concentration, almost more meaty than velvety. How to approach such a completely different Margaux? Certainly a great wine, indeed a great Bordeaux. If one is used to top Margaux vintages being very ripe, red-berried and lavishly sweet, with tannins clad in satin-silk, this one is rather powerful, with dramatic depth. Time will see! This Margaux 2005 clearly needs many years of bottle age to show everything it contains. It could then rank among the very best of the Left Bank. Why is the wine so meaty and showing a little less charm? One possible answer: in 2004 the blend had 18% Merlot. In 2005 only 8%. The Merlots showed extremely high alcohol (up to 15%) but brought fat with too little flesh and aromatics. Tasted again in May: fresh, floral nose, tar, licorice, smoke, very deep, tremendous spice, dry black berries. Dense, meaty, demanding and muscular on the palate, almost hard at the moment, showing more muscle than flesh and extract. A massive, patient Margaux that will struggle to mature and will be quite inaccessible for the first 20 years. 07: Madame Gunvor lured me, during the Académie du Vin trip, quickly into the decanting room asking me to help decant the 2001 for the group. It was just a pretext so I could quickly retaste the 2005 and 2006 Margaux. The nose is hot and alcoholic like a great Priorat wine, showing lots of raisins, fresh bread crust notes, tending more to red berries with herbal thyme and mint tones. On the palate there’s fairly massive astringency with grainy, monstrous tannins. To me it resembles the 1986 more and more. Hopefully it won’t follow the same path! (19/20). 14: Tasted before lunch at Margaux. Extremely dark color. Very classic nose. In this case, that means it already shows, in its core aromatics, traces of previous great Margaux vintages. Plenty of herbs and raisiny perfume, perfumed. On the palate it undeniably shows greatness, linear, massive astringency. On its way to becoming a great Margaux classic.

For a Château Margaux, this is an especially rich wine. The dense fruit, superripe but not overpowering, and the blackberry jam flavors show the richness of the year. There is wood alongside the juiciness and sweet tannins. Of course, it will age, but it's so delicious to drink now.