Winemaker Notes
With its ruby color and violet highlights, Haut-Batailley Verso 2022 has an expressive nose of red and black fruits. The palate is round, fruity, and well-balanced with hints of spices. It is a compelling wine with remarkable freshness.
Blend: 54% Merlot, 43% Cabernet Sauvignon, 3% Petit Verdot
Professional Ratings
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Jeb Dunnuck
Very floral, the 2022 Château Haut-Batailley Verso has beautiful black raspberry and cassis-like notes as well as hints of spicy wood and violet, medium to full body, a rounded, layered mouthfeel, and a great finish.
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Vinous
The 2022 Verso de Haut Batailley, taken mostly from the château’s young vines, shows the natural intensity of the year in its decidedly ripe profile. Succulent dark cherry, plum, spice, leather, tobacco and chocolate are all amplified. This is a decidedly heady, almost exotic Verso, but it should be a crowd pleaser. Drinking window: 2025-2032 -Antonio Galloni
Barrel Sample: 90-92 -
Decanter
Intensely fragrant, dark chocolate and blackcurrant. Smooth and supple, lively with good energy and a sharp, fresh and cool tang to the acidity which really makes this quite forward and vibrant. Still sleek with tension and focus, it’s not plush at all, the tannins are fine and slender with definition. Good concentration, acidity, and approachability. Lean but bright, forward and fun! 88IPT. 3.65pH. Ageing 12 months in one-year-old barrels. Harvest 20 September - 27 September.
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James Suckling
An expression of sweet berries, plums and currants on the nose as well as a touch of baked fruit. A slightly sweet-sour accent has a direct impact, giving this early appeal but less finesse or complexity. Fluid, juicy and firm at the end. Medium-long finish. 54% merlot, 43% cabernet sauvignon and 3% petit verdot. Drink in 2026.
One of the world’s most classic and popular styles of red wine, Bordeaux-inspired blends have spread from their homeland in France to nearly every corner of the New World. Typically based on either Cabernet Sauvignon or Merlot and supported by Cabernet Franc, Malbec and Petit Verdot, the best of these are densely hued, fragrant, full of fruit and boast a structure that begs for cellar time. Somm Secret—Blends from Bordeaux are generally earthier compared to those from the New World, which tend to be fruit-dominant.
The leader on the Left Bank in number of first growth classified producers within its boundaries, Pauillac has more than any of the other appellations, at three of the five. Chateau Lafite Rothschild and Mouton Rothschild border St. Estephe on its northern end and Chateau Latour is at Pauillac’s southern end, bordering St. Julien.
While the first growths are certainly some of the better producers of the Left Bank, today they often compete with some of the “lower ranked” producers (second, third, fourth, fifth growth) in quality and value. The Left Bank of Bordeaux subscribes to an arguably outdated method of classification that goes back to 1855. The finest chateaux in that year were judged on the basis of reputation and trading price; changes in rank since then have been miniscule at best. Today producers such as Chateau Pontet-Canet, Chateau Grand Puy-Lacoste, Chateau Lynch-Bages, among others (all fifth growth) offer some of the most outstanding wines in all of Bordeaux.
Defining characteristics of fine wines from Pauillac (i.e. Cabernet-based Bordeaux Blends) include inky and juicy blackcurrant, cedar or cigar box and plush or chalky tannins.
Layers of gravel in the Pauillac region are key to its wines’ character and quality. The layers offer excellent drainage in the relatively flat topography of the region allowing water to run off into “jalles” or streams, which subsequently flow off into the Gironde.