Château Pavie, St. Émilion Grand Cru, FR, 2022 (MAGNUM)

A mixture of dried herbs, blackcurrant leaf, blueberry, violets, vanilla and salty stones on the nose. Intense and complex, it’s upfront and mouth-filling with chewy, fleshy tannins but lifted by vibrant acidity. Controlled power, pure fruit focus, and a joyful, crunchy texture. Salty spice, liquorice, black chocolate, and clove add depth to the finish. A charming, structured wine, full of promise. (GH)

Wonderfully intense and concentrated, this is an impressive Pavie, muscular, intense and well constructed. It has an exuberance to the aromatics that is striking, with incense, baked damson, milk chocolate and creamy black cherry fruits, almost overwhelming until the limestone fingerprints hit in the mid palate to add tentson and salinity, even a hint of savoury freshness. Powerful, will take the full ten years to come around. 75% new oak. Buno Lacoste consultant. First year with the inclusion of Pavie Decesse and Bellevue-Mondotte, bringing it to 42ha, which is the biggest fully classified footprint, with 30ha on the plateau. Harvest 19 to October 1. 10th anniversary of classification and 25th harvest of Gerard Perse.

The grand vin from Pavie, tasted in Scotland as the wines were deemed not ready to taste by the Pavie winemaking team when I visited Bordeaux in December, is a blend of 52% Merlot, 30% Cabernet Franc and 18% Cabernet Sauvignon. The vintage is noticeable because it is the first under the new 2022 St Emilion classification, which permitted the vines of both Pavie-Decesse and Bellevue-Mondotte to be absorbed into the Pavie vineyard, signalling the end of the road for both those properties. Now it is in bottle – with its engraved ‘label’ to celebrate 25 years of Perse family ownership of the estate – the 2022 Pavie explodes with an array of rich fruit on the nose, all blackcurrant and dark griottes, all very clearly defined, backed up by a frame of crushed gravel and dark chocolate. The palate builds on this with a firm frame of rich and ripe tannins, confidently knit together, coated in dark and perfumed summer fruits, before a lengthy finish infused with ripe tannin and powdery oak. This is a superb grand vin with huge cellaring potential. The alcohol is 14.47% on analysis, with 14.5% on the label. (CK)