Tasted 9 Times Since Bottling With Consistent Notes The 1983 Le Pin offers a huge, soaring bouquet of smoky oak, spices, and sweet fruits. This splendidly opulent, voluptuously textured wine reveals the gorgeous sweetness and ripeness of fruit so much a hallmark of this estate. The 1983 Le Pin has low acidity, gobs of glycerin, superb extraction of fruit, and a sensational finish. It appeared lighter in its youth, with less aromatic and flavor dimension. Now that it has reached its plateau of maturity, it is one of my two or three favorite examples of this exotically styled, kinky wine. Drink it over the next 7-8 years.

This wine seems to have been better several years ago. It still is a great bottle of wine, but may just be beginning to slip in terms of intensity and complexity. Dark garnet with some orange/amber at the rim, its sweet ripe nose of Provencal herbs intermixed with licorice, tree bark, truffle, blackberry and cherry jam is followed by a medium-bodied, very lush, flavorful wine that is kinky, exotic, and just sumptuous. It needs to be drunk up, however. Anticipated maturity: Now-2009. Last tasted, 12/01.