2017 Mouton-Rothschild

I wish the Guildford to Waterloo commute ran as smooth and regularly as the golf buggies ferrying visitors between the reception at Mouton-Rothschild and the tasting room. It has become part of the ritual of en primeur. As usual I made two trips to the First Growth at the beginning and end of my three weeks, head winemaker Philippe Dhalluin explaining the minutiae of the growing season during my first visit. “There was a big frost on 27 April but we were not affected apart from Aile d’Argent, as the white grapes are not located on the warmest place. We lost two parcels out of five, about one-third of the production. It was mostly a very dry year from May to mid-September. The flowering was very good over 10 days. We were lucky to have an early cycle. We started the harvest on 6 September at d’Armailhac, 7 September for Mouton-Rothschild and finished all the harvest on 29 September. Our main issue was the drought. We had rain on the first or second weekend of September, around 25mm, that was good to help the maturity of the grapes. The week after, we had a spot of rain nearly every day and so finally this helped the maturity of Cabernet Sauvignon, but not so much for the Merlot. It means we have a little less Merlot than usual, 90% in Mouton-Rothschild. We started picking the Cabernet Sauvignon on 13 September. It was a long harvest because we wanted to pick at the perfect maturity and the drought had slowed down the maturation, making it come very slowly. So you needed to wait for some parcels and at the same time you needed to avoid over-maturity in other parcels. All the Petit Verdot this year is in the Grand Vin, even the Carmenère in the Clerc-Milon. It wasn’t a difficult harvest. The berries were small and solid but the rain had not caused any botrytis on the grapes. The wines were finished in mid-November because co-inoculate, so that when the alcoholic fermentation starts we had the malolactic. The yeasts ferment the sugar in one week and when this disappears naturally, the lactic acids start to ferment the malic and this inhibits any brettanomyces. All the wines were blended between 15 November and early December, except Le Petit Mouton in early January.”

Philippe Dhalluin has been on a roll since taking over the running of this First Growth, elevating Mouton-Rothschild to the top when some, including myself, were beginning to question its top ranking at the end of the 1990s. Nowadays there is absolutely no doubt. The 2017 is a more classic and slightly more austere wine compared to other vintages, the nose actually reminding me of Château Latour. It does not possess the flair or panache of the 2016 – this is more “correct” and “linear”, yet surfeit with freshness and energy. It may take longer to reach its drinking plateau than recent vintages so do be prepared to wait a decade before opening. Philippe blended the deuxièm vin, Le Petit Mouton later than others in his portfolio and I felt it was too reduced on first showing. I did taste it a second time but felt that it would be better to wait a little longer before assessing what has fast become one of the finest second labels.