Chateau La Mission Haut-Brion 2000 0,75L

Château La Mission Haut-Brion 2000

The Estate

Château La Mission Haut-Brion occupies hallowed ground in Pessac-Léognan, directly across the road from its sister estate Château Haut-Brion. With a history dating to 1698, La Mission has long been recognized as one of Bordeaux’s greatest properties, producing wines that rival—and often surpass—the classified First Growths in quality and aging potential.

Under the ownership of the Dillon family (who also own Haut-Brion), La Mission has achieved unprecedented consistency. The estate’s 29 hectares of vineyards benefit from exceptional terroir: deep gravel beds over clay, providing ideal conditions for Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon. La Mission’s style emphasizes power, concentration, and structure—wines built for the very long term that reward patient cellaring with extraordinary complexity and depth.

Pessac-Léognan: Where Power Meets Elegance

Château La Mission Haut-Brion’s vineyards occupy some of the finest terroir in Pessac-Léognan, positioned on a gravelly plateau that provides exceptional drainage and heat retention. The estate’s unique geology—deep Günzian gravel over clay subsoil—creates ideal conditions for producing wines of remarkable concentration and longevity.

What distinguishes La Mission’s terroir is its ability to produce Merlot of exceptional power and structure. The 2000 vintage showcases this perfectly: the Merlot ‘came in at a natural alcohol that exceeded 15%,’ requiring careful management to preserve balance. The final blend emphasizes this power while maintaining the elegance expected from great Pessac-Léognan.

The estate’s commitment to quality and terroir expression results in wines that ‘barely budge in their evolution’ for decades. The 2000’s slow development—tasting only 4-5 years old at age 12—demonstrates both the vintage’s exceptional concentration and La Mission’s terroir-driven aging potential.

The 2000 Vintage

The 2000 vintage in Bordeaux stands as one of the greatest of the modern era. Perfect growing conditions—warm, dry summer with cooling Atlantic influence, ideal harvest weather—allowed grapes across the region to achieve exceptional phenolic ripeness while maintaining balance. The vintage produced wines of extraordinary concentration, structure, and aging potential.

For Pessac-Léognan’s elite estates, 2000 delivered wines of historic proportions. La Mission’s achievement was particularly remarkable: the Merlot reached natural alcohol exceeding 15%, with final wine at 14.3% alcohol and pH of 3.8. The blend of 60% Merlot and 40% Cabernet Sauvignon captures the vintage’s power while maintaining classical proportions.

Robert Parker awarded this wine a perfect 100 points, noting: ‘One of the wines of the vintage, the 2000 has barely budged in its evolution since it was bottled… After ten years in bottle, it still reveals a dense opaque purple color along with a potentially sensational bouquet of blueberries, black currants, graphite, asphalt and background oak. Extremely powerful, full-bodied and superbly concentrated with good acidity and high but round tannins, this massive La Mission-Haut-Brion should take its place among this estate’s most hallowed vintages when it hits full maturity in another one to two decades. I was surprised by just how youthful this wine tasted at age 12. If tasted blind, I would have guessed it to be around 4 to 5 years old.’ The drinking window of 2020-2050 places it among Bordeaux’s most age-worthy wines.

Tasting Experience

• At 24+ years of age, the wine still reveals a ‘dense opaque purple color’—evidence of extraordinary concentration and youthful vigor. The bouquet is ‘potentially sensational’: layers of ‘blueberries, black currants’ form the core, while complexity emerges through ‘graphite, asphalt and background oak.’ The aromatic profile is both powerful and precise—a complete expression of great terroir.
• On the palate, the wine is ‘extremely powerful, full-bodied and superbly concentrated.’ The texture is massive yet refined—’high but round tannins’ provide structure without harshness, while ‘good acidity’ ensures balance despite the wine’s 14.3% alcohol. Flavors of dark fruit, minerals, and earthy notes fill the palate with extraordinary depth and persistence.
• Mid-palate complexity reveals the wine’s ‘massive’ structure: concentrated dark fruit mingles with graphite minerality, subtle oak spice, and complex savory notes. The wine’s evolution has been remarkably slow—at age 12 it tasted ‘4 to 5 years old,’ suggesting decades of further development ahead. This is La Mission at its most monumental.
• The finish extends with extraordinary length and intensity, leaving impressions of dark fruit, graphite, asphalt, and powerful yet integrated tannins. The wine has ‘barely budged in its evolution’—a testament to both the vintage’s concentration and the estate’s exceptional aging potential. It’s now entering its prime while promising another 20-25 years of evolution.
• This perfect 100-point wine represents ‘one of the wines of the vintage’ and will ‘take its place among this estate’s most hallowed vintages.’ For collectors seeking the absolute pinnacle of Bordeaux expression—power, concentration, complexity, and decades of aging potential—this La Mission stands as essential.

Service & Food Pairing

Serve at 17-18°C in large Bordeaux stems to accommodate the wine’s massive structure and complex aromatics. Decant 90-120 minutes before service to awaken this ‘extremely powerful’ wine—it needs substantial aeration even at 24+ years. The wine will continue evolving in the glass over 4-6 hours. This is a wine to savor slowly and contemplate deeply over an evening.

Exceptional pairings:

• Premium aged beef: dry-aged côte de boeuf aged 45+ days, prime rib with bone marrow
• Rich game meats: venison loin with blackcurrant reduction, wild boar with truffle sauce
• Powerful lamb preparations: rack of lamb with herbs de Provence, lamb shoulder braised in wine
• Intense cheese selections: aged Comté 36+ months, mature Manchego, blue Stilton
• Truffle dishes: beef Wellington with black truffle, truffle-crusted beef tenderloin

Cellaring & Evolution

At 24+ years from vintage, this wine is just entering its optimal drinking window—Parker’s prediction of ‘full maturity in another one to two decades’ from 2012 places peak drinking around 2025-2035. The wine’s remarkable slow evolution (‘barely budged’) suggests exceptional further aging potential through 2050.

The wine’s ‘extremely powerful’ structure, ‘high but round tannins,’ and ‘good acidity’ provide decades of foundation. Those opening bottles now will experience a wine in early maturity—still showing youthful power while beginning to reveal tertiary complexity. Patient collectors will be rewarded with 20-25+ years of continued evolution.

Store horizontally in a dark, vibration-free environment at 12-14°C with 70-75% humidity. This perfect 100-point wine merits the absolute finest storage conditions—it represents museum-quality Bordeaux with exceptional investment value. Provenance is critical for a wine of this significance and price level.

Collector’s Note: The 2000 Château La Mission Haut-Brion represents one of the most important Bordeaux wines of the 21st century—a perfect 100-point masterpiece from one of the greatest vintages of the modern era. Robert Parker’s extraordinary assessment—’one of the wines of the vintage,’ ‘take its place among this estate’s most hallowed vintages’—confirms this as essential for serious Bordeaux collections. The wine’s remarkably slow evolution (tasting 4-5 years old at age 12) and drinking window extending to 2050 make it both immediately compelling and a long-term investment of the highest order. With production limited and demand extraordinary, this wine offers exceptional appreciation potential alongside its transcendent quality. For collectors seeking the absolute pinnacle of Pessac-Léognan and perfect-score Bordeaux, this is a once-in-a-generation acquisition opportunity.