Vineyards at Chateau Meyney overlooking the Gironde

OK, so you’d expect to come away inspired by a trip to Chateau Margaux having spent an hour or so with the marvelously enthusiastic Paul Pontallier. You’d also expect to have a more profound sense of the natural beauty and deceptive simplicity of fine winemaking after spending some time with Alfred Tesseron at Chateau Pontet Canet. And you’d have to be made of stone not to be awe inspired by the new chais assembled by Jean-Guillaume Prats at Chateau Cos d’Estournel or the quality of his controversial 2009 grand vin whatever your verdict. But would you really expect to be all fired up after a visit to Chateau Grand-Puy Ducasse? Probably not, but that’s just what happened to me after I’d spent an afternoon there. I’ll explain more later but first some background.

2009 is a wonderful vintage for Sauternes and Barsac. It is not that common that the conditions for a great red wine year provide the same conditions for a great sweet wine year but this does look to be the case in this vintage. Although it is early days the wines in general have a wonderful delicacy and balance and the warm year produced ripe fruit, high in flavour and with high potential alcohol.

Just returned from a week-long trip to Bordeaux to taste the principal wines from the 2009 vintage and I have to admit that these wines are amongst the finest young reds I have ever tasted.  It is a truly extraordinary vintage in the Médoc, the best ‘Cabernet’ year in living memory. It is a vintage in which many of the classed growths are nudging nearly fourteen degrees in alcohol and yet somehow manage to display extraordinary levels of balance.  It also looks extremely good in Pessac-Léognan, is beautiful year in Pomerol and has produced the best sweet wine vintage for Sauternes and Barsac since 2001.