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The 1996 Pichon-Lalande is just as awesome from bottle as it was from multiple cask tastings. For Pichon-Lalande, the percentage of Cabernet Sauvignon is atypically high. This wine normally contains 35-50% Merlot in the blend, but the 1996 is a blend of 75% Cabernet Sauvignon, 15% Merlot, 5% Cabernet Franc, and 5% Petit Verdot. Only 50% of the estate's production made it into the grand vin. The color is a saturated ruby/purple. The nose suggests sweet, nearly overripe Cabernet Sauvignon, with its blueberry/blackberry/cassis scents intermixed with high quality, subtle, toasty new oak. Deep and full-bodied, with fabulous concentration and a sweet, opulent texture, this wine was singing in full harmony when I tasted it in January. Given the wine's abnormally high percentage of Cabernet Sauvignon, I would suspect it will close down. It possesses plenty of tannin, but the wine's overwhelming fruit richness dominates its personality.
Score: 96 Robert Parker,April 1999
Tasted at the château as part of a private vertical. The 1996 Pichon-Lalande has always been a marvellous wine and perhaps now it is beginning it even rival the 1982. It has a brilliant, Cabernet-driven bouquet with intense blackberry, cedar and graphite scents that remain resolutely linear - a nose that does not flinch. The palate is medium-bodied with fine tannins that encase layers of ripe black and red fruit interlaced with white pepper and cedar. This has a little more focus than the great 1995 and will probably last longer, demonstrating greater persistency towards the finish. Excellent. Tasted March 2014.
Score: 96 Neal Martin, September 2014
Light nose. Dark crimson. Very full and broad and well balanced and yet with hardly discernible tannin until the very very end. Quite forward but a lovely drink. Nothing out of place. A much better bottle than we saw in the first line-up. Drink 2005-12
Score: 17.5 Jancis Robinson MW, September 2006
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