Chateau Pavie 2020, Saint EmilionGrand Cru, Bordeaux, France, Red,75cl

This opens up on your palate like a butterfly. It takes your breath away. Purity of blackberry, raspberry and black cherry. Lavender. Very, very impressive. Full and chewy with tight and polished tannins that go on and on. Energetic and structured. Crisp and vivid. Superb finish.

Pure perfection in red wine, the 2020 Château Pavie checks in as 50% Merlot, 34% Cabernet Franc and the rest Cabernet Sauvignon, all raised in 75% new French oak. Absolutely incredible in every way, it has a sensational bouquet of crème de cassis, smoked tobacco, chocolaty oak, graphite, white truffle, and hints of flowers. Pure, full-bodied, and concentrated, with perfect integration of its fruit, oak, and tannins, it’s one of those wines that needs to be tasted to be believed. Hats off to the Perse team for not following trends and for continuing to make a truly Grand Vin that offers a rare mix of power and elegance.

Composed of 50% Merlot, 34% Cabernet Franc and 16% Cabernet Sauvignon, the 2020 Pavie weighs in with an alcohol of 14.82% and a pH of 3.61. It is aging in French oak barriques, 75% new. Opaque purple-black colored, notes of plum pudding, blueberry pie and dark chocolate-covered cherries charge out of the gate, followed closely by hints of eucalyptus, star anise, unsmoked cigars and fertile loam with a hint of cedar chest. The full-bodied palate is built like a brick house, offering very firm yet wonderfully ripe, velvety tannins and seamless freshness to support the densely laden, muscular black and blue fruits, finishing very long and with loads of mineral-laced layers. As hedonic as it is cerebral this year, it is a beautiful paradox. Barrel Sample: 97-99

The Cabernets dominate the blend on the aromatics, and you can really see they are moving the needle on the architecture and sculpting of this wine. A ton of concentration on the nose and upfront, but it is well balanced by damson and blackberry, and has a sense of energy, uplift and clear minerality. This shows the limestone terroir in a way that, with the best will in the world, the more concentrated style of Pavie just didn’t do. There is density and glamour, with layers of black chocolate, graphite and licorice. It is pretty disarming overall, and will age extremely well.
Barrel Sample: 97

Big, bold and rich with solid black fruits and dense tannins that are definitely not shy. This solid wine is packed with structure. The fruit and freshness of the year are almost overwhelmed by the wine’s richness. The wine is redeemed by the perfumed, balanced finish. Barrel Sample: 94–96