Pontet Canet 2012. Dinner party at mine with Hart, SP, Tabs and KT. Now THIS was a revelation, and a reminder of why wine tasting is so fucking interesting. Bottle 5/5 for the night from my stash. I’d previously posted this from S’s birthday and juxtaposed it against the 2014 vintage. My main comment was that the 2014 was the far superior vintage with a superb balance of fruit and tertiary notes, and I had complained that the 2012 lost all its fruits after 1-1.5 hours of decanting. This time around, we decanted the bottle and nosed it: dark fruit (mainly plum), and A LOT of leather and tobacco and licorice. We started pouring and tasting this about 20 mins in, and the wine was delicious. To be clear, the wine went through a similar development as the last time: the fruits faded quickly and the nose became leather and tobacco and cedar wood dominant. But this time round, we drank it early enough to enjoy the fruits on the nose, which gradually transitioned to become dried plums before trailing off. The good thing of course is that the 2012 has had some age, and the tannins weren’t too aggressive in spite of the short decanting. Overall, marked improvement – don’t bother decanting, just enjoy quickly.