January 14, 2025

Focus on the Bordeaux Left Bank !

EDITO

BORDEAUX'S LEFT BANK, HEART OF CRUS CLASSES

 Frédéric Lot

With its 113,400 hectares of planted land and 60 appellations, the Gironde vineyards belie any notion of the uniformity of Bordeaux wines. On the contrary, a real diversity of character - both landscape and organoleptic - is expressed in each appellation, from one bank to the other. Let's decipher its left bank!

Left Bank: a taste of aristocraty.

Enclosed to the east by the famous Gironde estuary (and one of its two rivers, the Garonne), to the west by a dense forest of maritime pines and the Atlantic Ocean, Médoc, Graves and Sauternais form, from north to south, the main valuable wine-growing areas on the left bank. The Médoc (4700 ha) and Haut-Médoc (4200 ha) are not only appellations, but also two wine-growing sub-regions. The Médoc “pays du milieu” includes “communal” appellations such as Saint-Estèphe (1370 ha), Pauillac (1200 ha), Saint-Julien (910 ha), Moulis (600 ha), Listrac-Médoc (670 ha) and Margaux (1350 ha). While the vines of some of these regions face the Gironde estuary - giving them an ideal temperate climate with their own micro-climates - Moulis and Listrac are much further inland, without lacking in style. All, situated on the famous 45th parallel, have found a veritable Garden of Eden. Thus, Cabernet Sauvignon (the majority grape variety on these gravelly soils made up of gravel and sand), Cabernet Franc, Merlot (an early-ripening variety that thrives on clay-limestone soils) and Petit Verdot (a late-ripening variety, The Indian summer has blessed them with the quintessence of fruit, with touches of subtlety, elegance, finesse and breed, not to say “aristocracy”. ”

Aristocratic yet imperial wines.

The Médoc is the most recent vineyard in the Bordeaux region, unlike the Libournais (the right bank) or the Graves. It was conquered from the water to the east and from the forest to the west. This part of the Gironde vineyards has “poor” soils made up of heaps of Güntz gravel from the Quaternary period (carried by glaciers from the Pyrenees or the Massif Central), with highly draining soils. These lands, originally partly marshy, were once developed by the Dutch (great polder specialists). The Médoc was also the historic playground of wine-merchant families from the 17th century onwards, who settled in the heart of the Chartrons district (at the time “outside the walls” of Bordeaux city center). All these nationalities (German, Flemish, Dutch, English, Irish) formed a veritable family of wine aristocracy, with a keen sense of commerce. There's no doubt that these merchants contributed - and are still contributing today with the current generations - to the international expansion of Médoc and Bordeaux wines in general.

In the 19th century, the Médoc peninsula benefited from a tremendous boost to the reputation of its châteaux (many of which belonged to certain merchant families at the time), thanks to an ingenious idea born of a very favorable context. The imperial classification was born. At the request of Emperor Napoleon III, and with a view to the 1855 Universal Exhibition, 6 wine brokers drew up a hierarchy of 60 Grands Crus Classés divided into 5 families; to which must also be added 26 Crus Classés from the Sauternes region, led by the supreme Château d'Yquem. The particularity of this classification lies in the inertia of the list, setting the hierarchy in stone forever. However, only one slight deviation from the rule was made in 1973: Château Mouton-Rothschild was upgraded from Second Cru Classé to 1er Cru Classé.

The Médoc saw the birth of another classification, but in the course of the 20th century. In 1932, the Médoc crus bourgeois were classified, and since 2008, this classification has been revised every year. Finally, there are the 300 “artisan” crus, the only vineyards in the world to be classified according to the quality of their wines.

Left Bank wines: every taste has its place!

Each at their own level expresses the singular character offered by a subtle, varied combination of soils and subsoils that are fairly common to the 8 Médoc Appellations d'Origine Contrôlée. While the Médoc and Haut-Médoc produce wines that are rather round, or both sappy and round (like Châteaux Sociando-Mallet, La Tour Carnet and La Lagune), Saint-Estèphe - like Montrose, Cos d'Estournel and Lafon-Rochet - plays on power on the palate. Pauillac (Pontet-Canet, Lafite-Rothschild, Mouton-Rothschild, Pichon Baron) displays uprightness and finesse, while Saint-Julien (Léoville-Poyferré, Léoville-Las-Cases, Ducru-Beaucaillou, Beychevelle) and Margaux (Palmer, Rauzan-Ségla, Prieuré-Lichine) express velvetiness and charm. Moulis (Poujeaux, Chasse-Spleen, Moulin à Vent) and Listrac (Clarke, Fonréaud, Lestage) have body and velvet to spare. But what they all have in common is their quest for elegance, digestibility and, depending on the vintage's reputation, a great aptitude for laying down: something that's not lost on northern European markets, and the UK in particular, still a great lover of mature Bordeaux wines.

Further south, from Pessac to Langonais: an ode to the deep!

We're in the heart of the Graves region, with three appellations: Graves (3600 ha), Pessac-Léognan (1300 ha) and Graves Supérieures (sweet wines). This region is a combination of plains and small valleys, just like the famous croupes that are so well exposed and drain excess water perfectly during heavy rains. Its vineyards, along with those of the Libourne region, are much older than those of the Médoc. Caressing both certain urban areas, some of which are enclosed (the prestigious Haut-Brion, La Mission Haut-Brion and Pape Clément in the commune of Pessac), or more on the edge of stretches of Landes pine forest (Smith-Haut-Lafitte, Domaine de Chevalier, Bouscaut, Haut-Bailly in the Léognan area), the Graves crus ensure a continuity of style thanks to a geology quite similar to that of the Médoc. However, the very mineral flavor of the dry whites and some of the reds from Pessac-Léognan (a young appellation created in 1987) reminds us of a real specificity of Graves, in the image of the variety of pebbles made of jasper, agatoid, flint, lydian, quartz and quartzite ochre, white, red and rosé. It's hardly surprising, then, that Graves wines immediately evoke geology. In fact, they are the only wines in France to bear the name of their soil: “Las Grabas de Bourdeus”, in other words, “les Graves de Bordeaux”. Graves is also a reminder of the major role played by this unique terroir in the quality of Graves wines, particularly in terms of grape ripening conditions. The gravel reflects the sun's rays, effectively redistributing the heat to the ripening grapes until they reach optimum maturity.  F.L.