Bordeaux 2009 settles into the starting blocks.

So everyone has now heard about the Bordeaux 2009 vintage. At Justerini & Brooks we have used our new website to augment our traditional approach to commenting on a new vintage with our blogs and video interviews to try and provide our customers with greater insight, and we will continue to release further interviews over the coming days. All the critics have also now published their views, and this week most collectors will have been studying the just-released musings of the American critic Robert Parker. We view his influence, or more specifically his impact, with mixed feelings. However, there is little doubt that, though not without disappointment, it is a vintage which justifies some exceptional claims. Our tasting notes on each of the wines have been uploaded on to the website, and we expect the campaign of releases to begin imminently. We do not, sadly, expect this to be a quick campaign. In fact with the hiatus scheduled for late May to accommodate a VinExpo in Hong Kong, we are presuming many of the top Chateaux will not be releasing their wines until June.

Justerini & Brooks get large allocations of classed growths, and our full buying team will be active throughout the campaign as usual. However, we are expecting demand to exceed supply with certain estates. In the interest of fairness we will continue to operate our allocation process where this becomes the case, which is based on a customer's three year cumulative spend with us. Our intention as always is to reward customer loyalty and those who collect a broader range of wines. We are not an investment club.

As with every vintage, our team of eight spent a week in Bordeaux tasting every wine we will offer. Please contact your account manager to let them know which wines you are interested in, or alternatively e-mail wishlist@justerinis.com . It is imperative that if you do not currently receive our e-mailed offers you also register your e-mail address into the J&B website to ensure you receive our notifications.

Spring has arrived when one hears the first cuckoo. Or if you are a wine lover, when en primeur begins. We have had a long cold winter, and it seems this year Spring is late.

Chateau Canon dinner and tasting

Our private dining room in St. James’s has been the setting for countless memorable wine dinners over the years and decades. But last night was a very special evening. John Kolasa, who runs Chateau Canon, came over to have dinner with a few selected guests and brought some fabulous wines with him. The evening started with a tasting in our cellars. Firstly with a barrel sample of the 2009 Canon, which was deeply impressive and full of velvety structure and perfume, which seems to be the signature of this vintage. The 2005, 2002 and 2000 were also shown. The 2005 was still a baby, but a genuine delight was the 2002, which had far more richness than was expected and if served blind would, we are quite certain, be placed by all in a grand vintage. The best of the 2002s remain some of the great deals in Bordeaux.

After a quick glass of Pommery Cuvee Louise ’99 to prepare ourselves for dinner, we headed off to the dining room. The first wine of the meal was the 1998 and it showed what Chateau Canon can do with sufficient age. The 1998s have now begun shrugging off their tannic cloaks and this wine was full of seductive vivacity and lift – absolutely beautiful, and a great match with the monkfish wrapped in Parma ham. The remaining three vintages were then all served from magnum. The 1985 had evolved into a mature, seamless and silky wine; very elegant indeed, and flattering to the savoury mille-feuille of porcini mushrooms. Next was a magnum of 1979, not by any means a good vintage in Bordeaux, but brought by John to show what great terroir can do in average years. The wine had restraint and class and, it seems, many years still ahead of it. It certainly stood up to the roasted sirloin rib. But the wine of the night was the 1955 Canon. This was absolutely outstanding. It tasted as if it were 30 years younger than it is, and was so seductive and still full of richness. It was so good in fact we drank two magnums!

With a delightful evening at a close a few of us then went on to Annabel’s. One of those ideas that seemed good at the time...

Germany 2009: Day 2

The day's tasting began at Willi Schaefer where we were met by the charming Christophe Schaefer.

In tasting our way through a beautiful set of wines from the Himmelreich and Domprobst vineyards in the village of Graach we discovered great "ripeness and structure but also fantastic ripe acidity". We came away stuck by their finesse, elegance and purity. An estate doing great things.

On route to Maximin Grunhaus we stopped at Reinhold Haart to taste his wonderful Piesport Goldtropfchens. A vineyard reknowned for producing some of the richest and most opulent wines in the Mosel, the 2009s are exotic but not without refinement, their richness and almost Rheingau-esk power coming from the soft slate soils and sunbaked aspect of the site.

Lunch beckoned but not before we climbed out of the Mosel valley and over to the Ruwer for all 20 wines in Carl von Schubert's stable. Daunted we began, but it wasn't long before we were totally immersed in a thoroughly impressive set of wines. The "dry" Abtsberg Superior (allowed to ferment to its natural conclusion) was powerful, balanced and intense. The top quality sweeter wines that followed were punctuated by the particular highs of the Abtsberg Kabinett, a Herrenerg Auslese of profound minerality and a final pair of incredible, showstopping Eisweins.

The post lunch session was filled by Karthauserhof, a short drive across the village. Christophe Tyrell was on hand, describing the wines as "a little bit of 2007, a little bit of 2005 and a little bit of 2003, maybe 40%, 40% and 20%". We took this to mean as a seriously balanced vintage. Which is exactly what we tasted.

Last but by no means least was our trip to Zilliken, in Saarburg. The great Rausch vineyard showing Wonderful ripeness and good true steely character; a superb trio of Kabinet, Spatlese and Ausleses.

Tomorrow the Nahe...

Germany 2009 - Day 1

Our first appointment of the day was an extended tasting with the gregarious August Kesseler. 2009, at this estate at least, is a vintage defined by his top quality dry wines, white and red. A superb selection followed, each wine showing its terroir but also a certain winery stamp of precision, finesse and detail. During an excellent lunch we tasted some really good Pinot Noir from 2007 and 2008; taut, linear yet ripe and built on minerals, fine tannins and spice. They showed just why Kesseler, the village of Assmanshauser, and in particular the slate soils of the Hollenberg are held in such high regard for Pinot Noir. They are not Burgundy, nor are they meant to be. They are something quite different, and all the better for it.

The afternoon saw visits to both brothers Haag. Thomas at Schloss Lieser and Oliver at Fritz Haag. Thomas would not pick out any particular highlights; he believes this is an outstanding vintage across the entire range. And tasting his wines from the basic QBA right the way up to an utterly scintillating Liser Niederberg Auslese Langhe Goldkap, we were loathed to disagree. The last wine promised great things, alas the TBA was still undergoing fermentation in the cellars, so was not tasted.

Oliver's vines in the monumental Brauneberger Juffer vineyard, in whose steepest heart lies the great Sonnenuhr, have done it again. Oliver describes 2009 as "a vintage that has more power than 2008, and perhaps more acidity than 2007". Here we did get to taste both BA and TBA, and we were not disappointed. Intense, brilliant with pitch perfect balance and huge levels of extract and acidity. They are quite simply sublime.

Our last appointment and it was along the Mosel and across the bridge to Wehlener to visit Manfred Prum. He has produced an outstanding set of 2009s, which even at the end of a long day’s tasting impressed us enormously. They are fascinating wines of great purity, backwardness, latent power and focus. They will require patience, but will undoubtedly reward those able to wait.

Tomorrow Schaeffer, Von Schubert and more......

Bordeaux 2009 - Parker is out!

This is often the biggest day in the year for many Chateaux, negociants, merchants and collectors; the day Robert Parker releases his scores for the current Bordeaux vintage. We have been waiting with bated breath for Big Bob’s reaction to this already massively hyped vintage. And he hasn’t disappointed, `for some Médocs and Graves, 2009 may turn out to be the finest vintage I have tasted in 32 years of covering Bordeaux. From top to bottom, 2009 is not as consistent as 2005, but the peaks of quality in 2009 may turn out to be historic`.

The headlines are impressive; more potentially perfect scores than ever before, 21 in all and a host of wines flirting with perfection in the 96-99 point category. There is also a new asterisk system that denotes the greatest potential seen at the estate in Robert’s 32 years of tasting; we lost count of the number of asterisked wines, but it is worth pointing out two outstanding successes that we got very excited about and it would seem that Mr Parker shares our enthusiasm: the sublime Saint Pierre from St Julien, which receives 94-98* and Malartic-Lagraviere Rouge, which receives 93-95*. He also continues with a message to consumers about the wines from the less celebrated appellations.

`I hope readers will take a serious look at many of the less prestigious appellations and wines from those areas as they will no doubt represent fabulous bargains in 2009. Given the overall style of the 2009s, which combine creamy, voluptuous textures and sensational fruit-driven opulence with remarkable finesse, precision, purity, and vibrancy, the best of the “little” wines will be delicious young, as will many of the classified-growths. This is a magical vintage!`