CHÂTEAU CANTENAC BROWN
BORDEAUX, FRANCE 2022
WHY BUY: BriO 2022 might just be the smartest $34 you'll spend on Bordeaux this year. Vinous declared this delicious Margaux “beautifully done” and “a big, serious wine” with “considerable richness and overall palate presence.” To which we’d just add: it’s not every day that you come across exceptional Margaux character at tablewine prices, and it's a wonderful thing to have this earlier-drinking, Cabernet-based expression of the estate's noble terroir. This is the ultimate Wednesday night wine, folks, with a fullness and a richness that make it impossible not to love ... or to keep filling the glass. We're also bringing you their 97-point flagship from a stellar 2020 vintage, and — reaching even deeper into their vault — a pair of 95-pointers from 2018 and 2010, to show you the concentration, depth, and length that bottle age has always brought to these wines.
WHAT THEY'RE SAYING: Vinous praised BriO 2022 as “a big, serious wine” where “dark cherry, plum, mocha, rose petal and cedar are all dialed up to the maximum,” calling it a “heady, potent Margaux” that's “beautifully done.” The flagship wines have earned equally strong reviews, with Vinous declaring the 97-point 2020 Margaux a “knock-out” and “a Margaux of towering intensity” that's “dense and vertical at the same time.” The 2018 earned 95 points from Vinous for its “ripe black fruits” that “shine through this balanced wine” against “rich, generous tannins,” while Wine Enthusiast awarded the 2010 vintage 95 points and made it a Cellar Selection, praising its “powerful and dense” character with “smooth, polished” structure that gives it “elegance and discreet fruitiness.”
OUR TASTING NOTES: BriO 2022 surprised me right from the first nosing; there's genuine weight and concentration here, unusual for a second wine, and (even more unusually) the complexity keeps building. A wonderful wine, generous but not loose, and accessible but also serious. And incredibly versatile, in being both a great companion at mealtime and late at night and all alone by the fire. The 2020 flagship — hailing from a stupendous vintage — operates in different territory entirely, delivering impressive concentration and polished tannins. It speaks the heady language of Margaux with command and grace. The 2018 finds a beautiful middle ground between power and grace, while the 2010 — with 16 years of bottle age to it — has reached that magical place where youth has given way to full maturity. This is smooth, sophisticated, utterly seductive.
THE STORY: When the Le Lous family acquired Cantenac Brown, in 2019, they found a Third Growth with all the right bones but consistency had been up and down, and as a result the output had not lived up to its rarefied classification. Their solution was blunt: tear down the old winery and build a $20 million replacement from scratch, carved from raw earth and designed around gravity flow. They acquired prime Cabernet Sauvignon parcels on the Margaux plateau while revolutionizing their extraction techniques to preserve the aromatic purity that makes great Margaux so distinctive. The transformation has been meteoric, and the results are more than encouraging. An inconsistent performer has transformed itself into a serious Left Bank contender that has critics taking a fresh look and collectors scouring the market for allocations.
WHAT TO PAIR THEM WITH: BriO works beautifully with a wide range of preparations, from slow-roasted duck with herbs to a lamb tagine to a board of ripe, aged cheeses. The flagship wines are made for beef — and beef in all its majesty: côte de boeuf with herbed butter, or a standing rib roast with horseradish sauce.
FUN FACT: If Cantenac Brown’s Tudor-style architecture looks more like an English boarding school than a traditional French vineyard, well — there’s a good reason for that: the estate was founded in 1806 by a Scottish merchant named John Lewis Brown.
OUR GUARANTEE: As always, we only buy and source directly from the estate to ensure that your bottles and cases arrive as they should and as you deserve: with pristine provenance guaranteed. Secure yours today!
*Offer NOT valid in-store. This offer is made pre-arrival, with wines estimated to be delivered to your preferred store in Summer 2026. With the supply chain issues that we are seeing globally, there may be some unforeseen delays which could affect the ETA. All sale prices are the lowest available at Total Wine & More and ONLY valid through Concierge Sales. No further discounts or coupons may be applied. Offer not valid in KS, MI, NY, OK, or TN. This offer is valid for TWO WEEKS, or until sold out, and will expire on Tuesday, April 7th, 2026.