Mature rim. Real lift - and then quite delicate. A good package that is just becoming ready to drink. Far from a blockbuster but great balance and grace - not words I would necessarily expect to write about Les Forts. The most popular of this flight - quite rightly. Drink 2005-15
The dense ruby/purple-colored 1996 Les Forts de Latour is exceedingly tannic, with cassis and mushroom-like notes in the aromatics. This full-bodied wine is impressively constituted and one of the finest Forts de Latours of the last two decades. Anticipated maturity: 2005-2018.
The 1996 appears to be the finest example of this wine since the 1982, although readers should no pass up the 1995 should it be available. The 1996 is a bigger wine than the 1995, exhibiting an opaque ruby/purple color, much of the same character as its bigger, more forceful sibling, but more accessible fruit, a rich, medium to full-bodied, spicy chartacter, and plenty of black currants and minerals in its personality.
