2006 Chateau Lamothe de Haux
Region: Premieres Cotes de Bordeaux, France
Variety: 60% Merlot, 30% Cabernet Sauvignon, 10% Cabernet Franc
(Disclosure: I cheated and did not take a photograph of our wine bottle; I grabbed this image from the internet. Rest assured that the bottle we have is 2006, not 2005.)
My take:
I was excited to try this wine – I love a good Bordeaux blend and the color was beautiful – a nice red-brown. The nose was light, which seemed perfect to go with pork tenderloin. That’s as far as my optimistic notes are going to go.
I think I finally had what I would consider a full-bodied wine. This wine feels quite thick and viscous in the mouth. I personally didn’t care for the texture. The taste is very light up front, a bit more brown in the middle, and you get some complexity in the finish, if you pull a good amount of air over the wine. However, if you’re just sipping this wine, it’s completely nondescript. It’s very short, with little complexity or flavor. After the first glass and making some notes about it, I found myself completely uninterested in drinking more.
Don't get me wrong..., I didn’t dislike the wine, but I didn’t like it all that much either. I will say, drinking it with dinner did lengthen the wine somewhat, but I still found it thin in flavor (not texture). Luckily, dinner did not disappoint. For any food network aficionados, I made Paula Dean's apple stuffed pork tenderloin. Now that I can recommend. It was easy and delicious!
Price point:
Your guess is as good as mine. Perhaps the Chateau Lamothe de Haux Blanc is better and/or more well-known than the Rouge. We got the red through our wine club and an internet search reveals lots of places selling the white, but I couldn’t find the red.
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i enjoy bordeaux and i find cru bourgeois selections to be better values with a certain complexity that cannot be found in california wines at the same price point and varietals. the risk as with any wine / region is that there are bound to be duds. i love to find great finds in those 'other' appelations in bordeaux, and PCdB has been one of my regular targets - but i think you and the hubs sum it up pretty well when a bottle just doesn't perform (short on flavor, really good descriptor).
ReplyDeleteoh, and btw - i read these posts through google reader, so i start with jonathan's first and then end with kerri's - and i usually comment on the 2nd post (in response to both). in case jonathan was offended i wasn't commenting on HIS posts. =)