This is incredibly intense and powerful with aromas of iron, spice and berry. Full body with a dense center palate of dark fruits and chocolate. Very long and refined. Balanced. Very closed.

Coffee, licorice, smoke, oak, wet earth and blackberry liqueur scents flood your glass. Deep in color, the wine is powerful, rich and clearly expresses its limestone terroirs. There is a polish to the tannins, and an elegance to the powerful, ripe black fruits. But make no mistake, this is a wine to lay down. It is not going to be fun to taste for at least a decade or more.

The wine is not as powerful as one might expect, given the owners and winemaking team, coming in at 14.3%. A sensational, rather massive example for a 2010, this opaque purple wine offers up notes of subtle barbecue smoke, blackberry and cassis as well as a hints of lead pencil shavings and a confiture of red and black fruits in the mouth. Full-bodied, unctuously textured and excruciatingly tannic, this is a big, blockbuster style of wine meant for 10-50+ years of cellaring.

This miniature 5-acre vineyard, beautifully situated in St.-Emilion, has produced a blend of 90% Merlot and the rest Cabernet Franc and Cabernet Sauvignon. Yields were 24 hectoliters per hectare.
-Robert Parker, Wine Advocate #205 Feb 2013

(93-95 pts)
2010: This 5-acre vineyard, purchased by Chantal and Gerard Perse in 2001, is planted with 90% Merlot and the rest Cabernet Franc and Cabernet Sauvignon. It sits on the plateau above Pavie Decesse and Pavie Macquin. Yields in 2010 were 24 hectoliters per hectare and the alcohol percentage is 14.3%. A dense purple hue is followed by aromas of crushed rocks, acacia flowers, boysenberries, kirsch and blacker fruits in the background. The wine possesses great ripeness, a dense, full-bodied mouthfeel, sweet tannin and a massive style. It appears to be more evolved and forward than most Bellevue Mondotte vintages have been under the Perse administration. Give it 4-5 years of cellaring and drink it over the following 20-25.

Saturated dark ruby. High-toned aromas of black raspberry, blueberry and smoky oak. Superripe, lush, chewy and deep, with a distinctly high-toned quality to the fine-grained flavors of wild dark berries, espresso, graphite and dark chocolate. For all its sweetness, there's no shortage of acidity here. The broad, sweet, building tannins give shape to the fruit of this massive wine, which remained impressively fresh in the recorked bottle.

This sports the ample, fleshy, powerful core of the vintage, with dark blue and black fruits, but has extra drive, with mouthwatering acidity and lots of minerality cutting through on the finish. Shows great mouthfeel and purity. —J.M.

A blend of 90% Merlot and 5% each of Cabernet Franc and Cabernet Sauvignon, this has a very intense, backward bouquet that despite leaving it five minutes in the glass, stubbornly refuses to open. The palate is very structure with a touch of graphite interlacing the ripe blackberry and liquorice tinged fruit (possibly from some very ripe Cabernets.) Very dense and powerful towards the finish, this is your quintessential vin de garde that will need long-term cellaring. Drink 2025-2040+ Tasted March 2011.