Tasting Notes:
97 points Robert Parker’s Wine Advocate
The 2009 Harlan Estate is just as impressive from bottle as it was from barrel. Cloves, dark plums, cherries, smoke and graphite add richness and resonance to this powerful, incisive wine. Juicy and exuberant, the 2009 has always had a certain raciness that is impossible to resist. Layers of fruit continue to build to the enveloping, sensual finish. Readers will have a hard time keeping their hands off this hugely delicious wine. Anticipated maturity: 2019-2034. Even after all of these years, and with much more intense competition than ever before, Harlan Estate remains one of the great wines in Napa Valley. The 2009s have fulfilled all the promise they showed from barrel, but the 2010s might be even better. I also had a chance to taste the 1992 Harlan Estate, a wine I sold for a whopping $60, a princely sum at the time, at a Boston area restaurant where I worked in the mid 1990s. At age 20, the 1992 is at a glorious peak of expression. What a wine! Bill Harlan’s Promontory remains a work in progress, and I imagine it will be some time before the wines are up to Harlan’s uncompromising standards. After all, it took Harlan and his team seven vintages to feel comfortable showing Harlan Estate to Robert Parker. The maniacal attention to detail I have seen in the vineyards at Promontory bodes very well for the future.
97 points Vinous
Stylistically, the 2009 Harlan Estate has quite a bit in common with the 2012, namely soft contours, plush fruit and tons of sheer immediacy. Now with a few years in bottle, the 2009 is just beginning to show the first signs of aromatic development. Deep, creamy and pliant, the 2009 can be enjoyed now, although it is sure to gain complexity over the next two decades. (AG) (9/2017)
96 points Wine Spectator
Offering a Pomerol-like silkiness, this is very rich and layered, with ripe dark berry, roasted plum and cassis flavors. Yet what’s striking is the texture, which has the density of the proverbial iron fist in a velvet glove. *Collectible* (JL) (10/2012)
93 points Decanter
The 2009 Harlan Estate is texturally more accessible than the 2010, and its sweet attack is beguilingly immediate. In its bouquet, notions of ripe red fruits compete with darker blackberry and cassis, while top notes of dried herbs and warm earth contribute complexity, as well as a tell-tale ‘sauvage’ quality. This is a supple wine that is easier to appreciate in its youth than the 2010, although there is no shortage of tannin behind all that fruit. (WK) (11/2017)
Bottle Size:
750 mL
Condition:
The bottle shown is the exact bottle you will receive.
Outstanding condition.
