1981 Domaine de Chevalier Rouge, Graves

“One of the best of the 1981 Bordeaux. It fills your mouth with ripe berry flavor and layers of tobacco and chocolate character. Full-bodied and truly velvety; long and rich. Drinkable now.--The Bordeaux 50.” (10/1994)

“The 1981 vintage of Domaine de Chevalier is another very strong wine and seemingly was harvested before the heavy autumn rains changed the fortunes of so many estates’ 1981s. The bouquet is beautifully expressive today, offering up a refined blend of black cherries, plums, bitter chocolate, nutskin, that DDC signature base of soil and a topnote of tobacco leaf. On the palate the wine is pure, fullish and complete, with fine complexity and grip, lovely balance and a long, soil-driven finish of melted tannin and bright acids. .” (09/2020)

“Quite rich and intense on the nose – ripe! Very sweet and beguiling though less terroir-marked than some other wines. Is this the 1982? Unresolved for the moment. Still a set of elements rather than a whole. This wine sems less marked by Dom de Chev character than many but is very flattering because of its ripeness. A very very good 1981. I thought it was the 1982! 18/20 points (JR)” (02/2006)