Château La Tour Blanche Sauternes

Old gold; rich, intense; powerful finish. Will age for many years. (Magnum)

2001 vintage

This '01 Sauternes from Château La Tour Blanche was enjoyed at BNO - Holiday Edition in Dallas, TX with some old friends and now new friends. Theme of the night was Champagne & Red Burgundy but we managed to include a few surprises along the way. Tasting notes will be in brevity as we were passing great wines around the table and were having even better conversations. Notes from tasting: Glimpse into this historic vintage the right way - incredibly …

2001 vintage

Anti KURK by PV (@ Zarzo, Eindhoven, The Netherlands) : Orange zest, honey and apricots, tangerine, botrytis. Concentrated sweetness nicely balanced by the acidity. Still quite youthful.

2001 vintage

A week of Wine on the Nile; 11/19/2025-11/25/2025 (Kemet Dahabeya, River Nile) : Caramel, concentrated pear juice, a hint of saffron, spiced honey. Not balanced and feels out of touch with its "Sauternesness"

2001 vintage

Cellared since release. Perfect cork. Mid amber. Beautiful aromas of grilled apricot, yellow peach, some botrytis notes, clementine and some light background minerality. A little pithiness to begin with, but after an hour or so, that resided and the wine really smoothed out. Unctuous in the glass with decent acidity and a round plush mouthfeel. A lovely 2001 that’s drinking really well now.

2001 vintage

Excellent shape, carmelized, graham cracker, apricots, botrytis, rich sweetness, tons of supporting acidity made this a lovely Sauternes. EWG Merlot/SB blends--whites and reds at Duck House

2001 vintage

From a 375 and picked up some oxidation. Cork was perfect. Enjoyable but i feel like I missed out on this 2nd bottle. Still nice with blue cheese after meal.

2001 vintage

Interestingly, the 2001 La Tour Blanche seems modest on the nose with a big hole in the palate at the outset yet it improves with a day of air. Showing a low/moderate intensity nose of marmelade and saffron, this doesn’t quite deliver on what the vineyard or 2001 vintage are capable of delivering. Lush on the palate, though lacking complexity and seemingly some acid. Pleasant but (like when I last tasted this in 2018) something of a let-down.

2001 vintage

The last bottle is still shining! Great candied fruit with nice depth.

2001 vintage

Mix of developed flavours and some fresh citrus notes. Drinking well.

2001 vintage

Creamy, balancing acidity, long and complex

2001 vintage

Color: medium amber. Nose: integrated alcohol, brown sugar, marmalade, some undergrowth. Very nice but not amazing. Palate: Big body, very sweet, medium-high acidity, a touch of lingering bitterness, but in all honesty, apart from this very good structure, I don't get extraordinary fragrance or intensity. Maybe stewed pear but that's a faint amount of fruit left. The finish is long and pleasant, though. I think this is an excellent wine but I have to disagree with the general enthusiasm from …

2001 vintage

Last of three purchased on release and stored in my cellar since. Deep gold color. Soaring nose of honey, citrus, orange blossoms, spices, and quince. Very complex and beautifully balanced on the palate with a very good balance of acidity and sugar to keep it from being cloying. Very long, honeyed finish. By far the best showing yet for this wine for me.

2001 vintage

This drank better than the bottle last year, which might have been corked to a slight degree. This bottle was rich and long with apricot and primary fruits still (somewhat surprisingly) dominating. This can easily go 10+ years for my taste. One hour decant before serving.

2001 vintage

Sweetness dominated everything, somehow sweeter tasting than prior bottles.

2001 vintage

A nice drink, it has lost some of its depth since I last tried it some 10 years ago. Still, it has nice fruit, with butterscotch and pineapple notes. Drink up!

2001 vintage

Pretty dark colour. Perfect nose of tangerine, caramel, glue and some pear. Thick and sweet but with good acidity. Lovely now.

2001 vintage

375ml, Medium amber with orange tint, Nose of Bees wax, dried apricot, marzipan, botrytis spice, hints of orange oil with some yellow flower lift. Palate full of lush waxy wall of semillon fruit, still some acidity left. Nose is more interesting than palate 3 hours after cork pull with honeyed fresh apricot, canned peaches and White Oak. Day 2 after vacuum and chill more expressive and lively with better acidity, white pepper and cantaloupe melon joining the show. Suggest a …

2001 vintage

From 50 cl [sic], perfect cork, P+P. Last recorded here on 25.06.2023, this bottle was perfectly, exquisitely, light-footedly, apricot and botrytis-drippingly, meltingly mature. I can't (or simply refuse to) afford this vintage of Yquem; I do look forward to opening my small stock of Climens, Suduiraut and Rieussec 2001, but this evening this bottle strikes me as truly extraordinary, the closest I have yet come to my ideal Sauternes. 96P

2001 vintage

Drunk in good company for M.'s birthday. Quite a bit of saffron on the nose, which is nicely complex. Thick, liquor-like palate, which is also complex and has good length. More acidity would have been nice, but it is lovely to drink anyway.

2001 vintage

Great half bottle but maybe not as good as the prior one. Nice botrytis, mouth feel and finish but the acidity seemed a little faded so there was some flabbiness I’d say. Still, this is nitpicking a bit on an otherwise excellent showing.

2001 vintage

Delicious mature Sauternes. What more needs to be said!

2001 vintage

4 years since my last bottle. Rich, unctuous, botrytis dialed up to 11. A saffron pineapple cake apricot jam bomb. Slight sense that the sugar is starting to drop out, but no hints really of tertiary complexity. Still could use a bit more acid and cut. Not convinced this will get any better but I don’t really have enough experience to know for sure.

2001 vintage

Déçu par cette bouteille de ce qui fut un grand Sauternes. Le vin me semble léger, il a digéré son sucre comme on dit, mais il manque de liqueur, de matière et de profondeur. Tout juste 89-90... Évolution défavorable, ou bouteille imparfaite?

2001 vintage

Tasted from a pristinely-cellared 375 cc bottle that had been popped and poured, this limpid, deep golden wine flaunts an intense aromatic profile of orange marmalade, peaches, apricots, honey, jasmine and crème brûlée. Unctuous on the palate, it delivers flavors in line with the nose. The beauty of this wine lies in its acid/sugar balance, maintaining a true freshness in the face of the decadent sweetness. Layered in the middle and long on the back end, this Sauternes remains classic …

2001 vintage

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