It is a toss-up as to whether Le Tertre-Roteboeuf, Lafleur, or Le Pin is Bordeaux's most exotic and kinky wine. Le Pin has taken on a mythical reputation, as evidenced by the absurdly stratospheric prices top vintages tend to fetch. There have been some great vintages of this wine, which possesses one of the most dramatic and ostentatious bouquets of any Bordeaux. Additionally, the micro-production of 500-600 cases guarantees a chic rarity that has also helped propel the price to astronomical levels. When it is great (1982, 1983, 1989, 1990, and 1995), Le Pin provides one of the most gloriously hedonistic mouthfuls of wine produced in Bordeaux. Critics of Le Pin feel it is too obvious, too tasty, and perhaps not as long-lived as its near-by neighbors of Petrus, Lafleur, and L'Evangile. Yet my experience suggests Le Pin improves significantly in the bottle. Tasted just before or just after bottling, the wine can often reveal a blatant, aggressive oakiness that dominates the wine's fruit. After 5-6 years of bottle age, the toasty, pain grillee aromas become less aggressive and better-integrated in the wine's personality. This has happened with every vintage to date. With that in mind, I am not surprised by just how splendidly the 1989 and 1990 have turned out. Both wines appeared in the blind tasting in the same series as Petrus, and they were not out-classed. The 1990 Le Pin is a point or two superior to the 1989, but at this level of quality, comparisons are indeed tedious. Both are exceptional vintages, and the scores could easily be reversed at other tastings. The 1989 is slightly tighter, with more noticeable tannin than the softer, lower-acid 1990. Both take flavor intensity and exoticism to the maximum. The huge, coconut, exotic spice, jammy black fruit, sweet, expansive flavors of these two vintages of Le Pin are to die for. The oak in both wines is more well-integrated than it was only a year ago, and thus the wines no longer seem disjointed. At present, the 1990 reveals a more expansive, chewier texture than the more firmly-structured 1989, but both wines are decadently rich, hedonistic, and opulently textured. I realize the pricing of Le Pin (can a top vintage of this wine really be selling at $4000 a bottle?) precludes most rational people from purchasing it, yet forgetting the hoopla and surreal pricing, these are great wines that are capable of two decades of cellaring. I would opt to drink them earlier rather than later. The 1989 should be drunk over the next 12-20 years.

A slightly firmer, more structured wine than the 1990, with similarly low acid but more noticeable tannin, the color remains a very healthy saturated ruby/purple. The nose needs more coaxing and offers up noted of coconut, roasted herbs, jus du viande, along with plenty of black currant and sweet cherry fruit with nicely integrated toasty oak. The wine has similarly high levels of glycerin to the 1990, but less accessibility, and more structure and possibly power. This is a remarkable wine, and certainly one of the great vintages for Le Pin. Anticipated maturity: 2005-2022. Last tasted, 12/01.