2014 Chateau Malescot St. Exupery Margaux Grand Cru Classe 750 ml

Smart-buy alert for Bordeaux collectors: This 96-point 2014 Château Malescot St. Exupery comes from a Third Growth Margaux estate that is a rather leisurely two-minute drive from First Growth Château Margaux. If you drive slowly enough with the window down, you’ll notice that the vines at Malescot are just as beautiful as the ones at Margaux that share the same exquisite terroir. But you won’t see any signs proclaiming the difference in price. 

A bottle of 2014 Margaux will set you back an average of $620, versus a bottle of 2014 Malescot, which is just $69 today. James Suckling honored the 2014 with a glowing 96-point review. Today’s wine has also been called “powerful, rich and explosive” by Antonio Galloni and full of “swagger and class” by Robert Parker’s Wine Advocate. A neighbor to Château Margaux from the excellent 2014 vintage for under $100—that’s as savvy as Bordeaux buys come, and they don’t come around like that very often. We have just 120 bottles.

Suckling scored the 2014 Château Margaux only a point higher than the 2014 Malescot St. Exupery, yet its price exceeds that of its neighbor by over $500. (When we tasted both side by side, we didn’t miss that extra point.) For just under $70 per bottle, the Malescot thrills with fresh raspberry marmalade and black cherries on the nose and palate as well as that classic leather, licorice, and herbal character we love in great Bordeaux. 

If the Michelin Guide rated Bordeaux châteaux, Malescot would certainly be “worth a special journey.” One of the most structured of the Grand Cru Classé wines in Margaux, and a steal at today’s price, we last made a special journey to the property in 2009, when it earned a slew of 96-98 point scores. 

The current owners have been improving the estate ever since 1994, and it is arguably making better wine than ever in its storied existence. Both the Malescot and the Margaux we tasted possess the power and structure to last decades in the cellar, but the Malescot is a wine that doesn’t require a decade or two of patience—it’s firing on all cylinders already.   

In 1827, the Count of St. Exupery purchased Château Malescot and the surrounding 15 acres of vineyards and then renamed his estate Château Malescot St. Exupery. 26 years later, following the death of the count, his widow was obliged to auction off this now-priceless domaine just a stone's throw from Château Margaux. 

(A quick side note: For those of us who spent hundreds of evenings reading bedtime stories to kids who refused to close their eyes, you surely remember Le Petit Prince, whose author was Antoine de Saint-Exupéry, the count's great-grandson. If you're a history buff, you may also recall that the novelist was also an aviator—one whose plane vanished mysteriously off the coast of France on July 31, 1944, during a reconnaissance mission for the American army.)

Château Malescot St. Exupery passed into the hands of the Zuger family in 1955, 11 years after the count’s great-grandson flew his final mission. As the war-torn economy rebounded, the château experienced a major renaissance. The surge continued into the new millennium—propelled by owner Jean-Luc Zuger’s diligence in the vineyard and the cellar.

Malescot St. Exupery’s meteoric rise wasn’t lost on Robert Parker. A decade ago, reviewing the 2010 vintage, the Advocate noted, “This estate, which has been on a qualitative crescendo for over ten years, has made a prodigious 2010 that ranks alongside their 2009, 2005 and 2000.” 

Lovers of classic Bordeaux would be wise to snap this beauty up quickly.