2022 Raymond Lafon
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Tasting notes
The 2022 Raymond-Lafon has a light and pretty, more floral bouquet with wilted white flowers filtering through the honeyed scents. The palate is viscous on the entry, with plenty of botrytis in situ though missing some acidity towards the caramel-tinged finish. Like some other Sauternes, this showed better last year, hence the question mark against my score. Tasted blind at the Southwold tasting in London.
Critic scores
Average Score
James Lawther MW, jancisrobinson.com
Neal Martin
More reviews and scores
The 2022 Raymond-Lafon is a wine that was not showing well from barrel, so I deferred scoring it. Now in bottle, it has a rich nose with scents of nectarine, clementine, honey and quince that may require a little more delineation. The palate is viscous in texture with notes of marmalade and quince. It has good depth and length, though it does not quite deliver the precision of the best Sauternes this vintage on the finish. Fine.
Only one-third of the crop went into the 2022 Raymond-Lafon, which contains 130 grams of residual sugar per liter. Evoking a complex, deep bouquet of orange blossoms, quince, orange peel, pineapple and dried apricots, it's rich and unctuous, layered and seamless, with a concentrated core of fruit and a long, endless and lovely saline finish. True to the estate’s style, this clean, focused wine will need time in the cellar to fully express itself.