So-called "bad vintages" often remain in the wine cellar: great wines, but a bad year. Who wants to put a "bad" wine in front of themselves or friends? Maybe it was even - as in this case - expensive at the time of subscription (like the 1997 Bordeaux vintage in general). And now - seventeen years later: a "discontinued model". René Gabriel: "Anyone who wants to experience a much too expensive Pomerol on its farewell tour must strike here." Such a harsh judgement spreads in the wine-lover world in no time at all. I have been distancing myself from these sweeping judgements for some time now, simply because I have very different experiences over and over again. Wines that are supposedly "very wide and taste like cooking chocolate and earthy contours" (according to Gabriel about this Evangile) develop quite differently in my glass. For example (as here): light cherry aroma, rose petals, rather gentle but with charm, soft, well-melded tannins, some mango or praline on the finish. Not a loud wine: but an intense, quiet, beautiful one... Have I come to another vintage? Was - somewhere and when - the label mixed up? It is not the first time that I have had this or a similar experience. On this evening, twice. Later, with a wine from Mission Haut-Brion, vintage 1993, also a wine that should have been dismissed "with suspicion" at the very latest. It was still resting in my cellar, like the 97 Evangile. And today it came into the glass. This permanent vintage discussion is proving more and more (and more often) to be character assassination of wines. I don't deny that there are better and "worse" vintages, that the vegetative development in the vineyard, the weather, especially cold and heat, but also hail, drought and I don't know what, have their effects, also on the wine. But just as influential is vinification, the winemaker's sense for the right measures at the right time. Yes, I'll go one step further: storage and - before that - the journey (or journeys) from the winery to the trade to the private cellar, but also perfect decanting and finally the "right" mood and the (often highly exaggerated) expectations are also important factors for a spontaneous and "fair" wine assessment. 
Admittedly, "old vintages" are far more dependent on the weather pattern of a year than today's, quite simply because people have learned in the meantime to take care of the vineyards accordingly, to reduce the quantity harvested and, above all, because pretty much all technical aids are available for processing, so that a fairly high quality can almost always be achieved. Vintage differences still exist, but they can hardly be described as "good and bad" any more; the difference lies much more in aroma, density and texture, for example. But this difference also exists at every winery and in every wine. With older wines - like this Evangile - the development in the vineyard is still more important. But it simply cannot be generalised - here is proof once again. They exist, good wines even from bad vintages. Even if it is just this one bottle. A coincidence that defies all probability calculations.