The other night we had a bottle of 1992 Chateau Latour from my cellar with a rack of lamb. Why, you might ask, did I cellar and still have a Bordeaux from 1992, a year that competes with 1991 as the worst in that decade? (It was our daughter’s birth year and we were celebrating her all-too-brief visit home from college.)
The wine was terrific, mature but still robust and suave and by no means tired. A few years back, I was lucky to have a bottle of 1946 Chateau Latour, also celebrating someone’s birth year. 1946, like 1992, was a horrible year for Bordeaux. But this bottle was 
wonderful. The message in those bottles is that talented producers make excellent wines even in poor—or as winemakers say, “difficult”–years.
It’s not unique to Chateau Latour. Under Jacques Lardière’s guidance, Maison Louis Jadot turned out superb red Burgundies in 1997, a marginal year at best in Burgundy. As I pointed out in a recent WRO column ("A Simple Strategy for Buying Burgundy“, which you can reach in the archive of my columns by clicking on my name at the bottom of the Home page), Domaine Meo-Camuzet made super wines in “difficult” years, such as a 1997 Nuits St. Georges aux Murgers, a 1992 Vosne-Romanée Au Cros-Parantoux and a 2000 Échézeaux. I can’t remember the number of times savvy sommeliers in France have recommended bottles to me from vintages generally regarded as poor that have turned out to be glorious wines.
What explains excellent wine from bad years? In part, the assessment of a vintage is, by its very nature, a broad generalization. Wine growing areas are spread over a broad geographic area where the climate will vary. In 1999, for example, the Médoc as a whole did fairly well, but the commune of Margaux made superb wines.
Selection by the winemaking team is undoubtedly a key element. Poor years occur because of adverse conditions during the growing season and/or harvest, which result in a higher proportion of unripe, damaged or diseased grapes. But it’s rare for all grapes to reach the winery in poor condition. Conscientious producers–and those who can afford it–will discard the not-so-good grapes and just make less wine, sometimes 50 or 60% less, using only ripe and healthy grapes. Finding those wines can be tricky. Sticking with superb producers or getting advice from critics or sommeliers with vast experience is one way.
Of course, there are also problem with assessing a vintage in the first place. Vintage assessment is usually done too soon after the harvest and is influenced by the assessment of the preceding year. The 1975 Bordeaux were highly acclaimed upon release, but turned out to be disappointingly hard and tannic for the most part. The 2003 Bordeaux, another vintage highly praised by many critics, are not developing the way many thought they would either. The 2001 Bordeaux, an excellent vintage, were overlooked for years because they were in the shadow of the more highly trumpeted 2000s.
So remember, vintage charts are a guide, they’re not a GPS.
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