Winemaker Notes
The wine is pale yellow with green hues. The nose is pretty discreet at first but as it opens up we discover fresh citrus aromas of grapefruit, then elegant hints of white flowers and star anise. It finally reaches its full aromatic expression with white and stone fruits aromas, peach, apricot and nectarine) to finish with on a great complexity of fruits, flowers and flint stones. The mouth is characterized by a frank, dynamic attack, then it reveals a larger body, smoother with a very beautiful texture. The palate, well chiseled by the acidity, develops a lovely suave and unctuous perception and stretches out over a very long period of time, fresh and thirst-quenching finish, with a nice mineral and saline dimension.
Blend: 90% Sauvignon Blanc, 5% Sauvignon Gris, 5% Sémillon
Professional Ratings
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Wine Enthusiast
Fresh, crisp but with intensity and ripe texture, this wine is the star of the white wines this vintage. It is tight, with minerality and acidity. Pink grapefruit, and a dynamic texture reveal its concentration. It will be a great wine from a great white wine vintage.
Barrel Sample: 98-100 -
James Suckling
This has so much blossom honey and white flowers with limes and other citrus. Stone and mineral undertones. Subtle passion fruit. A truly complex and great nose. Full-bodied and compact with fruit, phenolics and fresh acidity. Just a touch of sea salt. Very long and persistent. If you close your eyes, it’s like a great red wine. One of the best whites ever to come from here. 90% sauvignon blanc, 5% semillon, 5% sauvignon gris.
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Vinous
The 2021 Smith Haut Lafitte Blanc is one of the great white wines of the vintage. Soaring in its aromatic intensity and sheer volume, the 2021 saturates every corner of the palate with its unctuousness and richness. Even with all of that volume, the 2021 remains bright and sculpted. Crushed rocks, lemon confit, orchard fruit, white pepper and mint build into the memorable finish. The 2021 is positively stunning, that's pretty much all there is to it. –Antonio Galloni
Barrel Sample: 96-98 -
Decanter
Toasted oak, lanolin, honeyed caramel, lemon zest and red apple peel on both the nose and palate. This has an unctuosity, a richness to the texture giving beautiful honeyed lemon touches with Semillon fatness and intensity from the Sauvignon. It’s sleeping a little right now, feels as if it’s calm and quiet, not yet ready to show the world what it’s about but you do get a precision and detail along the edges, a real sculpting of elements. I love the presentation, such a success for the vintage, excellent winemaking on show. It's the soft vibration you get as the flavors travel from start to finish that is so promising - a lot of life and immense enjoyment to come from this.
Barrel Sample: 96 -
Jeb Dunnuck
The 2021 Château Smith Haut Lafitte Blanc (90% Sauvignon and 5% each of Sauvignon Gris and Sémillon) is similarly crisp, focused, and chiseled, yet has another level of concentration. Racy citrus, lime, and graphite fruit notes are support by beautiful minerality, minty herb, and sappy flower-like aromatics. These carry to a medium to full-bodied, concentrated white offering perfectly integrated acidity, a balanced, layered mouthfeel, and a clean, dry finish that keeps you coming back to the glass. This beauty will benefit from 4-5 years of cellaring and have over two decades of longevity.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2021 Blanc has developed gracefully since en primeur, delivering attractive aromas of ripe pear, peach, lime tree leaves, verbena and mint intertwined with mineral, smoky nuances. Medium to full-bodied, satiny and concentrated, with a broad attack and fleshy mid-palate, it exhibits compelling purity and tension, concluding with a saline, mint-inflected finish. It has the potential to improve in the cellar over the next decade or more.
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Wine Spectator
Plump, with an enticing edge to the mix of lemon curd, jasmine, honeysuckle and white peach flavors. Shows length too, with paraffin and salted butter details filling in. A touch shy on depth and cut overall, but this is still well ahead of the pack in this vintage. Sauvignon Blanc, Sémillon and Sauvignon Gris. Drink now through 2029.
Sometimes light and crisp, other times rich and creamy, Bordeaux White Blends typically consist of Sauvignon Blanc and Semillon. Often, a small amount of Muscadelle or Sauvignon Gris is included for added intrigue. Popularized in Bordeaux, the blend is often mimicked throughout the New World. Somm Secret—Sauternes and Barsac are usually reserved for dessert, but they can be served before, during or after a meal. Try these sweet wines as an aperitif with jamón ibérico, oysters with a spicy mignonette or during dinner alongside hearty Alsatian sausage.
Recognized for its superior reds as well as whites, Pessac-Léognan on the Left Bank claims classified growths for both—making it quite unique in comparison to its neighboring Médoc properties.
Pessac’s Chateau Haut-Brion, the only first growth located outside of the Médoc, is said to have been the first to conceptualize fine red wine in Bordeaux back in the late 1600s. The estate, along with its high-esteemed neighbors, La Mission Haut-Brion, Les Carmes Haut-Brion, Pique-Caillou and Chateau Pape-Clément are today all but enveloped by the city of Bordeaux. The rest of the vineyards of Pessac-Léognan are in clearings of heavily forested area or abutting dense suburbs.
Arid sand and gravel on top of clay and limestone make the area unique and conducive to growing Sémillon and Sauvignon blanc as well as the grapes in the usual Left Bank red recipe: Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Cabernet Franc and miniscule percentages of Petit Verdot and Malbec.
The best reds will show great force and finesse with inky blue and black fruit, mushroom, forest, tobacco, iodine and a smooth and intriguing texture.
Its best whites show complexity, longevity and no lack of exotic twists on citrus, tropical and stone fruit with pronounced floral and spice characteristics.