Bordeaux: potentially essentially the most famous and widely recognised wine area on this planet however not exactly at the height of fashion at present. Bordeaux itself is a port-town sitting on the river Garonne leading to the Gironde estuary on the west coast of France; a key to its enormous commercial success. It is France’s largest produce of AOC quality wine, with over 112,000 hectares planted with vines and nearly a quarter of all high quality wine in France is produced here. Not only that, but lots of France’s most prolific wines and producers hail from this cool, wet a part of the country with costs for the first growth wines stretching into the stratosphere, notably since the 2009 and 2010 vintages when Asia first ventured into the fine wine market in force. Nonetheless, all of the glamour and wealth from the highest estates paints a false image; the highest Chateau make up a paltry 5% of total production. The rest is shared between an increasingly impoverished and struggling group of producers, numbering over 7000 on the last count. As a result, the market of Bordeaux is especially sophisticated with a youthful generation of wine drinkers unable to purchase the highest wines and the majority of producers struggling to make ends meet in opposition to the new waves of more accessible, New World wines.

The half the place Bordeaux gets difficult is its many classifications and trade buildings; it's certainly the most heavily categorized wine area in the world with only Pomerol exempt from a rating system of sorts. Essentially the most famous of those was the 1855 classification of the Medoc which has largely defined essentially the most well-known Chateau in the entire area of Bordeaux. Sauternes and Barsac have been classified at the same time separately for candy wine production. Not to be not noted, Graves determined to create their own classification for his or her Chateau in 1959 and St. Emilion has updated their own classifications as recently as 2012, albeit with some very high profile legal battles within the process. Small wonder most customers find Bordeaux to be a difficult region to navigate and this is earlier than getting onto the subject of negociants, en primeur tastings, increasing territories, overseas investment and significant opinion, with Bordeaux to be a big marketplace for among the worlds most highly acclaimed wine writers and wine merchants. Nonetheless, there’s simply no better option to discover a area than by ingesting a couple of glasses of its wine as we delve into it, and on that note, here are the wines we chose to assist us navigate our method around the area:

Le Petit Haut-Lafitte Blanc 2013 — The second white wine of Chateau Smith Haut Lafitte, Grand Cru Classe wine from Pessac-Leognan; a mix of eighty% Sauvignon Blanc and 20% Semillon. The white wines of Bordeaux, whilst only making up 10% of total production, are considered by many to be the finest white wines within the world. Typically the wines specific a cooler climate expression of Sauvignon Blanc with plenty of citrus, white stone fruit and gooseberry aromas with a softer, more floral aroma depending on the level of Semillon and/or Muscadelle. These wines are often oaked and in the case of Le Petit Haut-Lafitte Blanc, for 10 months in 50% new oak with constant lees stirring. There’s a wonderful balance of toasty oak, crisp acidity and fresh fruit flavours with a wonderfully complete texture. Delicious stuff!

Chateau Fourcas Dupre 2010 — Now we head to the Listrac-Medoc, one of many lesser appellations of the area and the highest in altitude. Typically on the left-bank of Bordeaux you’ll find a higher focus of Cabernet Sauvignon, at the most northerly restrict of the place it would ripen. The key here is the well-drained gravel soils that assist retain and mirror heat back onto the grapes, giving them the extra increase they need in the final weeks of the ripening period. Chateau Fourcas Dupre is an efficient quality producer focusing primarily on red wines, with the Fourcas Dupre being their ‘Grand Vin’, with other atypical wines with a majority of Merlot in the blend. Nonetheless tightly knit together after almost 7 years of age, this is an excellent value-for-money buy and showcases how good wine from the ‘lesser’ appellations can typically be. Recent, structured and full of young fruit, slowly evolving into the standard graphite and cedar of left bank Bordeaux.

Chateau Haut-Bergey 2010 — Back to Pessac Leognan now for a take a look at a wine with some pedigree; Chateau Haut-Bergey. Purchased in 1991 and renovated heavily by Sylvain Garcin-Cathiard, Haut-Bergey now produces round 50,000 bottles of their prime wine each year. A blend of fifty four% Cabernet Sauvignon and forty six% Merlot and aged in 30% new oak for sixteen–18 months, this could be very a lot a modern expression of Pessac-Leognan. The 2010 we drank was only just starting to show itself, tightly wound and filled with graphite, dark fruit, toast and licorice. Given time, this will be a real beauty and is really very consultant of a high quality classic, where wines will typically take a bit of longer to open up and specific themselves. The wait is normally worth it!

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