Compare and Contrast Chateau Palmer to its
Second Label Alter Ego.
2021 Chateau Palmer Reviews
Futures Pre-Sale Price $315.00
Shipping After November 2024
A blend of 56% Merlot, 41% Cabernet Sauvignon and 3% Petit Verdot.
97 Pointz James Suckling
There’s brightness and clarity to this young wine, with blackcurrants, violets, lavender, and blackberries. Medium body with a solid core of fruit and a long, fresh finish. Fine tannins. Bright acidity. 56% Merlot, 41% Cabernet Sauvignon and 3% Petit Verdot. From biodynamically grown grapes.
97 Pointz Vinous
The 2021 Chateau Palmer is one of the truly epic wines of the year. It’s not the 2018, but it is in that vein, albeit at 13% in alcohol. There’s tremendous richness and sheer extract here. Blackberry jam, chocolate, smoke, licorice, lavender, and mocha notes possess remarkable primary intensity, more like a young must than a wine with a few months of age. Readers will find a Palmer that offers a compelling mix of opulence and energy.
97 Pointz Robert Parker’s Wine Advocate
The late-ripening, low-yielding vintage has delivered a beautifully balanced wine of striking intensity in the 2021 Chateau Palmer. Unwinding in the glass with complex aromas of blackberries, exotic spices, licorice, violets, and burning embers, it’s full-bodied, layered, and enveloping, with a deep, concentrated core of fruit, ripe tannins, and lively acids, concluding with a long, expansive finish.
If recent vintages of Palmer have set new records in their power and richness, the 2021 marks a return to the classical proportions of the 1990s—with all the additional concentration and precision that Thomas Douroux’s pioneering viticulture and thoughtful winemaking have brought to the equation at this address in the interim. The grand vin is a blend of 56% Merlot, 41% Cabernet Sauvignon and 3% Petit Verdot, picked between September 24 and October 15. Tasted twice.
97 Pointz Wine Enthusiast
The wine is dense with warm tannins supporting black fruit tones and acidity. Juicy and spicy, the wine’s Cabernet Sauvignon shows so well with black currant flavors. It is fresh and it obviously it will age well.
93 Pointz Decanter
Perfumed chocolate cherries with bramble tones on the nose. This has a rich and round mouthfeel, clear structure on show but also with life and lift – a sweet, bright cherry element given definition by strict but fine tannins. You have a really beautiful, delicate opening, quite wide and airy then the depth arrives on the mid palate, with chalky tannins and red fruits coming into play before the spiced liquorice enters on the finish. The texture is striking, velvet-like with layers and a sublime verticality of freshness and minty aeration. It may be less glamourous and overtly plush and seductive than bigger previous vintages but I love the classicism on show – a focus, precision and sophistication. Superb winemaking from Thomas Duroux who successfully navigated the difficult vintage conditions in 2021.Versus
Versus
2021 Alter Ego de Palmer Reviews
Futures Pre-Sale Price $80.00 ( Buy in Lots of Three)
Shipping After November 2024
95 Pointz James Suckling
Savory black and salted-olive character with oyster shells and black licorice. Fine, almost powdery yet firm tannins. Medium body. Excellent density and structure for the vintage. Second wine of Chateau Palmer. 60% Cabernet Sauvignon, 32% Merlot and 8% Petit Verdot. From biodynamically grown grapes.
94 Pointz Vinous
Chateau Palmer’s 2021 Alter Ego is fabulous. Dense and rich in the glass, with positively explosive energy, the 2021 dazzles from start to finish. A rush of dark cherry, plum, spice, blood orange, menthol, and licorice infuses the palate with tremendous intensity. Hints of rose petal and pomegranate appear later to round things out. The 2021 possesses tremendous textural richness that is evident from the very first taste. The aromatics alone are especially present today.
93 Pointz Decanter
Cigar box, tobacco, cedar, and cinnamon – really gorgeous savoury tones with smoked earth and dark chocolate mingling with the black fruits. High acid, touching on sharp and slightly sherbety but there is a lovely chew to the fruits, mouthfilling, mouthwatering, and appealing with the freshness from the higher percentage of Cabernet Sauvignon in the blend.
Smooth and delicate with a layer of seduction in the richness of the fruit and the overall depth. Wide flavours in the mouth, expansive and open with bright strawberry and red cherry juice at the end, so sweet and succulent and moreish. Not so exuberant but full of easy enjoyment, a successful second wine in 2021.
93 Pointz Robert Parker’s Wine Advocate
The 2021 Alter Ego de Palmer is a somewhat unusual blend, in that it’s fully 60% Cabernet Sauvignon this year, the estate’s Merlot having suffered in the April frosts. Exhibiting aromas of cherries, sweet berries and plums mingled with hints of spices and pencil shavings, it’s medium to full-bodied, ample, and polished, with a charming, seamless profile founded on beautifully refined structuring tannins.