Bordeaux is Back By Mark Criden Picture your ancient Uncle Carl. Okay, maybe that’s tough, because he lives across the country and you haven’t caught a glimpse of him for almost twenty years, since his retirement party in fact, but it’s family reunion time and there he is across the room and — What the hell? That’s not the doddering, fragile old goat you expected. That boy’s got more than a twinkle in his eye, more than just a spring in his step. He’s watching the Osbournes, knocking back a double iced latte, diving into the mosh pit —and is that a tattoo? Can this really be Carl? Man, this old dude rocks! Welcome to Bordeaux 2002 Hidebound, antediluvian, and tossed on the ash heap of lost causes more than a decade ago, Bordeaux may be the most happening place in the world of wine these days. Like Jason, Red Bordeaux is back from the dead with a vengeance, but unlike the star of the Friday the 13th series, he’s now welcome at the table most any old time. Bordeaux, of course, had long been groomed to be the boss. Enterprising farmers and merchants first pegged it as primo wine country back in the fourth century A.D. Nestled in the southwestern corner of what is now France, where the river Gironde crooks into an elbow on its way to the sea, Bordeaux is blessed with both a warm climate often ideally tempered by cool winds off the Atlantic and soils perfect for the maturation of grape vines. At their best, the cabernet-based wines from such luminous towns as Pauillac, Margaux and St. Julien on the river’s left bank, or the Merlot-dominated wines from the right bank’s St. Emilion and Pomerol, were the apotheosis of well-structured, medium-bodied reds, with matchless intensity of flavor and aroma, infinite complexity, and the legendary ability to age and improve in the bottle for decades. For many wine lovers, not only did wine have to be red to be great, it had to be Bordeaux. And there’s no doubt that in a fabulous year—say, 1961, 1982 or 1990—a red from a great Bordeaux estate could be an epiphany. Pop a cork from a well-cellared bottle and the bouquet can fill a good-sized room with a veritable riot of aromas: blackberries, currants, plums, cassis, tobacco, lead pencil, chocolate, and cedar. Take a sip and the balance—the equilibrium of tannins, acids and other flavor components—is ideal, with no rough or sharp edges to distract you. Then swallow and the finish—that sensation of still being able to taste the wine after it’s gone down the gullet—seems endless. While home to the most famous names in the wine world, like Lafite, Mouton, Latour, and Petrus, it wasn’t just the juice at the top of this pyramid that provided excitement. Many of the other “classified growths” further down the pecking order could prove breathtaking. For me, the 1982 Pichon Lalande, a second growth from Pauillac, provided my most thrilling wine experience. A decade later, I can still taste it. But the wine lords of the Gironde were not content producing the world’s greatest red wine. By the 1960s and 1970s, nestled in their grand chateaux, believing their own snob appeal marketing that whatever they bottled was wonderful, they crossed over to wine’s dark side. Red Bordeaux was no longer just a sensational drink: it became a trophy, and usually for the very rich. Instead of a great companion at dinner, the wine became—like racehorses and oil paintings—the province of well-heeled collectors who would rather admire their bottles than open them. But this growing arrogance blinded the Bordelais (as the lords of Bordeaux were known) to three especially ominous trends in the last part of the twentieth century: •New lifestyles. Red Bordeaux had long been the dinner partner of great haunches of beef and lamb. But few ate like this anymore. •Modern homebuilding techniques provided great rooms, kitchens the size of basketball courts, and regal bathrooms, but often no cellars, much less wine cellars. And Bordeaux, by and large, was built to be aged—for at least a few years, if not decades—at cool temperatures. •The rise of consumerism. European wines in general and French wines in particular are among the most user-unfriendly of products and intimidating to boot. There are two reasons: 1.) Vintages. Whereas a California Cab, though always attractive, might grow more voluptuous from one vintage to the next—think Gwyneth Paltrow to Sandra Bullock to Madonna—Bordeaux in a rainy or cold year might well resemble Ross Perot, both scrawny and hard to swallow. (As repositories for these sorry bottles, the long-suffering English have always come in handy.) 2.) Place name labeling. The French especially make a huge deal over the concept of terroir which roughly means that where the grapes grow affects how the wine tastes. Sound simple? Well, maybe if you’re a Professor of Oenology at the University of Bordeaux, or fairly deeply into wine geekdom. But the average earthling at dinner just wants to know: What’s this gonna taste like? So it’s less than helpful when you want a cabernet, and a waiter offers up a St. Julien. Merlot your fancy? We have Pomerol, m’sieur. It was little wonder then, that by the mid-1970s, the fabled region began to sow the seeds of its own downfall and little mystery why the red wines of Bordeaux seemed destined to become the vinous equivalent of the dot matrix printer. Bordeaux was set for a fall, and, after a succession of mostly mediocre vintages in the sixties and early seventies, Bordeaux got it. In 1976, Steven Spurrier (not the 49er’s quarterback; this guy was an Englishman running a wine school in Paris) organized a wine tasting pitting the best of California against their French rivals. The deck was stacked against the New World pretenders. All the judges were French. The American wines were imported under shadowy conditions designed to disturb their equilibrium. But with four top Bordeaux reds battling six California Cabs, damned if first place didn’t go to the Americans (a tasting of California Chardonnays and white Burgundies also produced an American victory). The French were more than astonished; they were defeated. They had long trumpeted the superiority of the Gaullic product. The winegrowers of Bordeaux had spent centuries building an unscalable mountain of quality, with sheer, unsurmountable cliffs. But it was off those cliffs that the mighty had fallen. Almost overnight, the media heralded the superiority of California winemakers and their wines. Their wines were everything most Bordeaux—even the top growths—were not: rich, accessible almost immediately after bottling, full-bodied, fruity. Easy to understand and easy to love. Even those that were complex—and their ranks grew into the eighties and nineties—seemed far more mellow and user-friendly than their French counterparts. In Napa and Sonoma, California’s premier grape-growing regions, Cab became King of the world, as names like Mondavi, Dunn, Laurel Glen, Montelena, Ridge, Beringer, Silver Oak, Arraujo, Abreu, Colgin, Bryant, Harlan and Screaming Eagle replaced Lafite, Latour and Margaux as haunting objects of desire. This trend only intensified when Bordeaux suffered from poor weather every year from 1991 until 1994, and produced largely shallow, forgettable wines, while the rich, fertile soil of northern California produced one seemingly great vintage after another. But if the Bordelais were arrogant, they weren’t stupid. The long dry spell in the first half of the last decade gave them plenty of opportunity to examine their loss of market share and reposition themselves. The most conscientious grapegrowers realized they had to reduce their crop yields to produce more concentrated wines. The most astute vintners understood that prudent investments coupled with careful vineyard practices and bottling techniques could produce wonderful wines from even less-famous vineyards. And the most enlightened winemakers saw that while they couldn’t compete with California Cabs on New World terms—their thin soil would rarely produce the huge, juicy grapes that grow so well in the loamy Napa dirt—they could match, and even outdo the Americans where it really counted: at the dinner table. For as the Californians raced first against the French and then against each other to produce the world’s most compelling cabernets, their wines became bigger, more alcoholic, and framed with such oak flavors that many of them became unpalatable. To many California winemakers, big and rich became not so much powerful as muscle-bound. A sip of these sumo-cabernets might be enjoyable, even fun, but a glass became an ordeal, a bottle, a war. Even the greatest wines were often jammy, and thus not especially refreshing, or imbued with head-spinning levels of alcohol. These bottles may be impressive, but the only companionable entrees may be saber tooth tiger steaks and mastodon meatloaf. So, quietly at first, and then with intensity as the nineties closed and the new century began, the reds of Bordeaux again regained their place as number one. Today, there are far more Bordeaux at all price levels that offer lively flavor interest, wonderfully expansive aromas, and yes, the possibility of aging comfortably if you have a cool cellar, than ever before. True, vintages matter; I’d avoid, for instance, the ‘97s, which are pretty hollow (leave ‘em for the British.) And the arrogance of French winemakers has not exactly been effaced (witness the predatory pricing of the celebrated 2000s). But in the words of that celebrated wine critic, Peter Townsend, “Meet the new boss. Same as the old boss.” Recommendations Here’s a cheat sheet. All wines are from 1999, a graceful, charming easygoing vintage that is in the shops now. Although many will hold for a decade or more, most will be delicious today. (Special favorites are marked with a *). Look for these same wines from the 2000 vintage when they are released later this year, but expect to pay a fat premium for this millennium vintage, which the famous critic Robert Parker calls, “the greatest vintage ever.” Top Values (Should be $20 or less) *Moulin St. Georges (St. Emilion) *Aiguilhe (Castillon) *Fleur de Bouard (Lalande de Pomerol) *Reignac (Bordeaux) Belle Vue (Hat Medoc) Bernadotte (Haut Medoc) Cap de Faugeres (Castillon) *Clos du Marquis (St. Julien) Fontenil (Fronsac) Pricey ($20-$60, but smokes anything from California at that price) *Montrose (St. Estephe) Grand Puy Lacoste (Pauillac) *Pichon Baron (Pauillac) *Ducru Beaucaillou (St. Julien) Leoville Barton (St. Julien) Bahans Haut Brion (Pessac Leognan) *Sociando Mallet (Haut Medoc) *Pavie Macquin (St. Emilion) Peby Faugeres (St. Emilion) Ouch (Over—maybe well over—$60) Lafite Rothschild (Pauillac) Latour (Pauillac) Leoville Las Cases (St. Julien) *Palmer (Margaux) Margaux (Margaux) Haut Brion (Pessac Leognan) Ausone (St. Emilion) Pavie (St. Emilion) Peby Faugeres (St. Emilion) Monbousquet (St. Emilion) Mark Criden, the former chair of the Buffalo Branch of the International Wine & Food Society, frequently reviews wine and otherwise haunts Internet wine boards. He is also a private wine cellar consultant. Back to the Table of Contents Back to Top