FRANCE: Bordeaux
2016 Gold: 5 Silver: 13 Bronze: 6 Commended: 8
2015 Gold: 4 Silver: 7 Bronze: 5 Commended: 8
There’s been a bit of a renaissance from Bordeaux in this competition over the past few years – and it carried on again this year. Five places on the Gold List was a strong performance – not least because our tasters found good wines across the price points, from the eyebrow-raisingly cheap Château Haut Roudier at sub-£7 (!) to the sublime fifth-growth Château Pédesclaux from the utterly lovely 2010 vintage at just over £40.
Yes, we’d have liked to see more whites – they are real somm wines, so their persistent non-appearance every year is utterly baffling – but otherwise this was a good performance.
Looking at the medals in more detail, we see a persistent theme emerging: specifically, the fact that the Left Bank has consistently done better in this competition than the Right.
The reasoning is always the same: even when they’re a little on the tight side, there’s an elegance to the wines from the Medoc that often isn’t there from the likes of St-Emilion, where the fruit is blowsier, the tannins more clunky and there is a general feeling of disjointedness.
With time, of course, many of these faults will ease as the wine knits together, so it’s worth keeping an eye on some of the younger Silver medal winners, which should start to come into their own over the next year or two.
FROM THE TASTING TEAMS
‘Top-end Graves whites are structured and weighty, with good fruit on the mid-palate – you can pair them with many dishes.’ Kelvin McCabe, Yauatcha City
‘We don’t have Bordeaux By The Glass at the moment. Usually when people buy Bordeaux they know what they’re going for. Michaela Večeřová, Galvin La Chappelle
‘There were some great products and some good value for money from £5-£16. It was a great surprise to see so many entries from Bordeaux that were good value for money.’ Julien Sahut, Sexy Fish
‘I’m not sure you go to Bordeaux for excitement. Someone who works for Georges Duboeuf told me Bordeaux is your wife, Burgundy is your mistress and Beaujolais is a young girl who you flirt with.’ Simon Woods, team leader
‘For entertaining clients, Bordeaux is still a go-to wine.’ Chris Wood, Chelsea Vintners
‘As we went up the prices, the wines got better. From £15 there were some good wines that I’d list.’ Zuzanna Rogowska, M Restaurants
‘There was good consistency in terms of quality across the flight.’ Daniel Murray, Berners Tavern