The glory of Graves in 2005

These 56 Pessac-Léognan reds were tasted blind in London for Decanter magazine, which will be publishing the results of the panel tasting in their December 2008 issue.

The standard was high; the wines expressed a range of styles but most showed the depth and concentration characteristic of the vintage. On the one hand, this produced fine, well-structured wines full of flavour and still too young to drink; on the other, it seemed to me to reduce the number of wines that had the classic Pessac-Léognan/Graves perfume that I particularly enjoy. It is worth noting that I gave high scores to...