- CRITICAL REVIEWS
- WINEMAKER NOTES
Jeb Dunnuck
Robert Parker Wine Advocate
Vinous
2016 Chateau Gazin Pomerol, France
Feminine and seductive, due to the dominance of the Merlot, Château GAZIN’s wines can be enjoyed after a few years in the bottle, but usually they are worth laying down for fifteen, twenty years or more.
Their sumptuous generosity offers a wide aromatic range of red and black fruit which harmonizes with their intense crimson or garnet red colour.
They typically offer hints of plum, chocolate, coffee or liquorice, with aromas of almonds, toast, tobacco and vanilla, and a minty freshness.
With maturity they develop a spicy nose, with a hint of truffles, notes of undergrowth, game, fur and leather.
2016 is undoubtedly one of the best vintages of the last years, in line with 2009 and 2010. The summer brought to the vines their quotas of sun and rain, especially 20mm of rain, on September 13, which allowed to perfect the maturity of the grapes. The harvest was made in very good weather, spread over three weeks, from September 22 to October 17. Our Merlots were picked between September 22nd and October 10th with many stops to wait for the optimal maturity of each piece of vines. The Cabernets Francs and Sauvignon were harvested on October 17th.
This vintage produced 85,000 bottles of great wine. It consists of 87% Merlot, 8% Cabernet Sauvignon and 5% Cabernet Franc. Its alcoholic degree is 14%. Aging 18 months, with malolactic fermentation in new barrels for 45% of the great wine and in vats for 55%, then in barrels of a wine for this last batch, brought a bottling, in June 2018, without collage with egg whites. The second wine from the vineyard, Hospitalet de Gazin, produced 22,100 bottles of the same vintage.
2016 is in the same style as 2015, but more powerful and fleshy, and already very silky in the mouth thanks to the maturity of its tannins. The wine offers a nice freshness, a round and ample attack with a lot of length. The nose always in this early youth of the wine is fruity (notes of red and black fruits: cherry cherry and blackcurrant). Like all pomerols, this wine will evolve towards notes of undergrowth, leather, truffle after a few years of aging in your cellar, which will bring all its complexity and finesse. To wait preferably 8/10 years. But consumable today after a little rest in your storeroom thanks to the finesse of its merlots and the freshness of its cabernets.