One man’s meat is another man’s poison. If botrytis was the enemy across most of Bordeaux in 2013, it was certainly most welcome in Sauternes and Barsac. The warm and humid conditions favourable for the development of ‘noble’ rot from mid-September onwards, allied to drying winds, proved the classic mix for a very good sweet wine harvest in 2013. The region has produced many beautiful wines with the vintage’s trademark acidity. It gives extra freshness and vibrancy. Some are comparing the quality to 2007 and 1997. Château d’Yquem has produced something tremendous, but there are also very impressive efforts from Château Coutet, Château Doisy-Daëne, Château de Fargues, Château Lafaurie-Peyraguey, Château de Rayne Vigneau, Château Rieussec, Château Sigalas Rabaud, Château Suduiraut and Château La Tour Blanche.

If anything 2012 Sauternes and Barsac is a little better than expected in what was an extremely difficult harvest in the region, spoiled by vintage rain. The very best wines are light yet with enough depth to make appetizing sweet wine that will be comparatively early maturing. A few are in a strange sort of purgatory, a half-way house position, between sweet styles and the off-dry, emphasizing the kind of all-or-nothing risk taking that Bordeaux’s bravest winemakers undertake here each vintage. There’s always the danger that you might get left high and dry in Sauternes [no pun intended] and some brave souls clearly have.

A week ahead of Bordeaux’s 2012 primeurs week, just what have proprietors on the Left Bank been saying about the vintage? The consensus seems to be that, despite a very tricky spring and early summer, the vintage was saved by dry and hot conditions in late July and August and some useful rain at the end of September which helped the final ripening of the grapes. Things might actually have turned out very well indeed – a vintage similar to 2000 was being touted by some at the end of September – had it not been for more considerable and progressive rain that came in mid October onwards.

Chateau d’Yquem: A brilliant 2011 but no 2012

The quality of the 2012 vintage in Sauternes and Barsac risks being unfairly overshadowed by Yquem’s decision not to make a grand vin this vintage, closely followed by the same news from Château Rieussec, writes David Rowe in the first of a series of 2012 Bordeaux previews.