2020 Chateau Clerc-Milon, Pauillac, France (750ml)

WINEMAKER'S NOTES: 

The wine is a deep cherry red with garnet highlights. The nose reveals an intense and complex array of aromas on which macerated black fruit mingles with liquorice and cedarwood. On the attack, the creamy, silky mouthfeel combines depth, density and supreme elegance, leading into a rich and smooth mid-palate on blackcurrant and bilberry flavor illuminated by attractive freshness over a rounded refined tannic structure. The harmonious finish is distinguished by lingering fruit flavors and mineral notes.

Blend: 53% Cabernet Sauvignon, 37% Merlot, 8% Cabernet Franc, 2% Petit Verdot.

TASTING NOTES: 

Blackcurrants, black licorice, violets and lavender. Aromatic and perfumed. Full- to medium-bodied with tension and focus, and very fine, linear tannins that run the length of the wine. Starting to close now. Serious Clerc. Better after 2029.

- James Suckling, 97 pts. 

Subtle, delicate, not shouting but delivering a really nuanced glass of wine with lots of fresh acidity and soft sweetness but also a herbal element giving spiced red fruits in the glass. Feels less serious than d'Armailhac, more upfront and open, but lovely detail too. Soft, such high acidity, really so lifted in the glass, a lovely purity, clean and clear. I love the grippy tannins that almost clean the palate leaving a crushed velvet texture on the tongue with lots of generosity. Super appealing and already very pleasant and pleasing to drink.

- Decanter, 95 pts. 

Rich and smoky, this wine has great presence. Tannins are almost sweet with their roundness, the wine enveloping the structure with the jammy black fruits. The wine will age well. Drink from 2027.
Editors' Choice

- Wine Enthusiast, 95 pts. 

Aromas of dark berries, cigar wrapper, exotic spices and burning embers introduce the 2020 Clerc Milon, a medium to full-bodied, fleshy and layered wine that's seamless, concentrated and refined, with lively acids and a long, saline, violet-inflected finish. A blend of 53% Cabernet Sauvignon, 36% Merlot, 8% Cabernet Franc and the balance Petit Verdot, it's a terrific effort from this clay-limestone terroir that has benefited from so much investment in recent years. Best After 2027.
Rating: 94+

- Robert Parker's Wine Advocate, 94 pts. 

The 2020 Château Clerc Milon brings another level of finesse and is a big step up over the Pastourelle. Kirsch, blackberries, graphite, lead pencil shavings, and a crushed stone-like sense of minerality give way to a full-bodied, nicely concentrated, tannic 2020 that's balanced and has terrific purity, followed by a great finish. A serious Pauillac, it warrants 7-8 years of bottle age and will have 20-25+ years of overall prime drinking.

- Jeb Dunnuck, 94 pts. 

Sleek and refined, with a very fine-grained structure supporting a core of black currant and black cherry reduction notes along with hints of chalky minerality and sweet tobacco. The long finish has cut and energy, thanks to savory nuance.

- Wine Spectator, 94 pts.