A stunning wine with extraordinary concentration, but still somewhat backward, this 2000 needs much more time than I projected seven years ago. It boasts an inky/dark purple color along with an intense nose of kirsch, blackberries, licorice, caramel, and flowers. Full-bodied with abundant tannin as well as a multidimensional, thick texture, this unevolved Pomerol has not changed much since its 2003 release. Gorgeous purity and a natural mouthfeel make for a dazzling wine that will benefit from another 5-10 years of cellaring, and last for three decades thereafter. It is a legendary effort!

The 2000 l’Eglise-Clinet was picked from 18 September and matured in 80% new oak. This has a magnificent bouquet with black fruit infused with bay leaf, smoke, freshly rolled tobacco and a touch of spice. The palate is medium-bodied with fine tannin, quite firm in the mouth with blackberry, clove, allspice and white pepper. This has always been a very complex millennial Pomerol with a very grippy, quite masculine finish and therefore decanting is advised. Denis Durantou informed that this was the only vintage neither fined nor filtered. Tasted at the l’Eglise-Clinet vertical at the château in April 2018.

This has everything. Super class and elegance, yet ripe and exciting. Fantastic aromas of blackberries, cherries, violets and minerals. Full-bodied, with incredible raspberry, cherry, mineral and silky tannins. Very long. Winemaker Denis Durantou is a purist, and it shows. Best after 2012. JS

One of the wines that turned me on to the brilliance of Denis Durantou when tasted during a vertical with him and Michel Rolland back in 2014. I tasted it again this week and it more than lived up to my memories, with its understated power and rapid expansion through the palate as its exotic character becomes clear, coupled with the precise brush strokes that Durantou always managed to coax out of his wines. He died in May 2020, just as I was beginning to taste En Primeur 2019, and it seems only right to raise a glass to his memory. Drinking Window: 2020 - 2040
Tasted by: Jane Anson Part of Jane Anson: My top 10 fine wines of 2020

The first of the great wines produced under the direction of Denis Durantou, picture a boatload of chocolate covered cherries, truffle, plum liqueur and Asian spices in the complex aromatics. On the palate, the wine is full bodied, dense, rich, plush and exotic. The wine is youthful, exuberant, sensuous and rich. You can drink this now. But I’m waiting for 3 to 5 years before popping my corks. This is the last vintage aged in 100% new, French oak. The wine reached 13.5% alcohol, with no touch of heat. Tasted May 2015

Full ruby-red. Sweet, superripe aromas of dark fruits, game, chocolate and beefsteak tomato. Offers a near-exotic sweetness in the mouth, which is accentuated by mocha and woodsmoke notes, yet manages to maintain its balance thanks to a healthy pH of 3.7 and huge but thoroughly ripe tannins (the IPT was 86!). This has the creamy intensity brought by small berries. Since 1997, Durantou has been using only natural manure as fertilizer, and the result has been somewhat lower pH levels, which have given his wine more energy.