Bordeaux (France)

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Bordeaux as a wine region which is quite vast with many famous Chateaus and regions with their own interpretation but first and foremost it is mainly a red wine area characterised by Merlot, Cabernet sauvignon, and cabernet franc. It is usually separated into the left and right banks. On the left you have the Medoc area where many famous First Growers (please see the end on a note on this system which is related to the 1855 classification) such as Chateau Lafite-Rothchild, Chateau Latour etc are located and for these wines often Cabernet sauvignon is prominent.

On the right bank you have more merlot-based ones with the St Emilion and Pomerol areas being the most famous ones around Libourne which is a city with 25k citizens. South of the city of Bordeaux you have Sauternes and Barsac famous for its white botrytis (often called noble rot) semillion sweet wine and between the right and left bank you have Entre Deux Mers (between two seas) which does not have the fame as any of the banks.

Related links

We have divided in into zones to provide a bit more information but please also check out our trip report to St Emilion located here which is a trip we can deeply recommend. We also have 3 set of flashcards in our evergrowing page of wine flashcards namely 77 questions regarding Bordeaux and 46 questions for WSET Level 3 and WSET Level 4 respectively.

 

Medoc and Graves (Left bank)

This area is usually divided in an odd way where you have the subregion of Medoc (yes, same name!) as well as Haut-Medoc. Haut means “upper” but if you would think that Haut-Medoc would be be placed north of Medoc then you would be wrong! Most of the Medoc is under 1m from sea level as it is old marshland. This is also the area where many of the First Growers (more on this below) are located such as Saint Estephe, Paullaic, Saint Julien, Listrac Medoc, Moulis, Margaux are some of the more recognisable names/areas of the area. As initially mentioned cabernet sauvignon is the dominant grape of this region and as an example the famous Chateau Margaux have 75% cab sauv and if you compare that with 60-70% merlot in the Bordeaux region overall.

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Graves is the french name for “gravel” which  is a reference to the ground where the grapes grow. Many frenchmen would argue that there is an overly focus on grape varieties while terroir is much more important on the flavour of the wine. This argument certainly does appear reasonable in an area where blends of 3 mainly grape varieties are the norm and especially if you add that the percentage of grapes will depend year to year causing the grape mix to be variable while the terroir will remain.

 

Right Bank (Pomerol, St Emilion etc)

This area around the city Libourne is famous for a stronger merlot-base and St Emilion and Pomerol are probably the most famous regions which both are red wine only regions with clay and chalk. St Emilion is definetly a recommended visit while Pomerol have great wines but has been described as not the ideal destination for wine tourism as it is quite sleepy. The slighly cooler climate of St Emilion makes that it is less capable of ripening cab sauv and merlot stands for 2/3 of the vines planted.

St Emilion

The city is about 35 km from Bordeaux and have about 2000 citizens. It is a a medieval city in the south-west of France. The romans planted vineyards here in the 2nd century and of course, wine is key here. It is mostly famous for its red wine and has a focus on Merlot (60%) and Cabernet Franc (30%) but also have some Cabernet Sauvignon (around 10%). It counts for about 6% of the total Boredeaux vineyard

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Restaurants in St Emilion

Les Delices du Roy 4.5/5 (tripadvisor)

Duck! Foie gras! Oh yes, we are in France alright! Mains dishes are around 15-25€.

Le Bistrot Des Vignobles (fb)

White Wine

90% of the wines are red but given the size the 10% is still a significant volume of wine, compared to most wine regions. The whites are made of sauvignon blanc, semillion mainly but there are also muscadelle, ugni blanc, colombard, merlot blanc and sauvignon gris planted.

Flavours and grapes

Cabernet sauvignon, merlot, cabernet franc, malbec and petit verdot are used for red bordeaux. There are 3 main classes which is Bordeaux, Bordeaux Superieur and Crus classe.

Flavours (red)

  • Black Currant
  • Cedar
  • Violet
  • Rock
  • Cedar

Wine Recommendation

Maison Blanche Montagne St Emilion – £32 swig –  official web site.

1855 Classification and First Growers

If you read about Bordeaux you are likely to hear about the World Exhibitaion when Napoleon ordered to create a quality classification system that ranks all the wines in Bordeaux in terms of quality. The issue with this system is that it bases quality on the vineyards that existed almost 200 years ago. Even if we admire history we would prefer a system that is based on the quality of the wine made today and also would let other producers in. Please find a link to read more about this classification.

Cru Clasifications of Bordeaux

Similar to the 1855 Classifications we believe that sometimes there is an overly focus on memorising classes and definitions while importance should better be put on understanding the mechanics behind wine. Having that said, see below the Cru Clasifications of Bordeaux

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The list

 

Related links

https://winefolly.com/deep-dive/a-primer-to-bordeaux-wine/

https://www.wine-searcher.com/regions-saint-emilion#:~:text=Saint%2D%C3%89milion%20is%20an%20appellation,of%20both%20quality%20and%20quantity.&text=Unlike%20the%20wines%20of%20the,from%20Merlot%20and%20Cabernet%20Franc.

https://www.wine-searcher.com/saint-emilion-classification.lml

https://www.thewinecellarinsider.com/bordeaux-wine-producer-profiles/bordeaux/the-medoc-margaux-st-julien-pauillac-st-estephe-chateau-listings/

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M%C3%A9doc_AOC

https://www.chateau-margaux.com/en