1954 Château D'Yquem - Sauternes 1er Grand Cru Classé

This was a bottle with level at already mid shoulder and hence a color even darker than usual. Luckily, no signs of seepage were showing anywhere so expectations were still quite high, this was a legend after all : the Lur Saluce family have been producing sweet botrytised wines at the chateau since the end of the 18th century. But besides its great heritage, this particular bottle hadn’t a lot in its favor with the lower level and dark color and on top of that 1954 not being the best Sauterne vintage.
Pouring it was is like pouring dark golden syrup, it came out in a thick steady stream, immediately clinging to the glass with incredibly viscosity. It was dark amber colored and immediately opening up with tons of aromas. First the honey hits you with a concentration deep enough to bring a hibernating bear back from its sleep, then was followed by dried apricots and orange zest covered in dark chocolate, cognac and orange liqueur, with some rich creaminess and a touch of caramel at the back. From the very first sip it’s the sweetness that obviously dominates, but there is enough nice acidity here as well managing to keep it all together with again that slight bitterness of the caramel in the finish. And what a finish this has : exhaling I ran out of breath long before the last aromas of this wine had dissipated, we’re talking minutes here, not seconds. If this is Yquem from a lesser vintage after 60 years, I’d love to be there when someone opens up a bottle of 1937.

Yquem truly is in a league of its own, thus incomparable to other dessert wines, so even more impossible to compare to the Evangile we had before. All I can conclude is they both were exceptional and this tasting just made it very difficult for us to come up with something interesting for next week…