AmericanWinery.com

An area in southwestern France considered by most wine enthusiasts as the world’s greatest wine-producing region because of the large quantity (ranging from 700 million to 900 million bottles annually) and the high quality of the wines. This large region has about 280,000 vineyard acres and essentially covers the same territory as the département of Gironde. At its center lies the seaport city of Bordeaux, which sits on the Garonne River upstream from the Gironde estuary, which empties into the Atlantic Ocean. The Bordeaux region’s fame dates back some 2,000 years when Romans first sang the praises of its wines. The wide popularity of Bordeaux wines in the United Kingdom (where they’re called clarets) can be traced back to the period from 1152 to 1453, when the English owned this region, which was acquired through a royal marriage and then lost in the 100 Years’ War. Bordeaux gains most of its fame from its red wines, which generally make up over 75 percent of the production. Nevertheless, the region’s rich, sweet white wines from Sauternes are world renowned, and its dry white wines from Graves have a serious following. Bordeaux’s primary appellations (see also Appellation d’Origine Contrôlée), which cover the entire region, are Bordeaux AC—for red, white, and rosé wines—and Bordeaux supérieur AC—a designation for red and rosé wines that requires lower grape yields and slightly higher alcohol levels than basic Bordeaux. However, Bordeaux is broken up into many districts and contains numerous individual appellations. The five main districts that have individual appellations are Pomerol, saint-émilion, Graves, Sauternes, and, most important of them all, Médoc. Within Médoc, there are many individual communes with specific appellations as well. Some of them, like Margaux, Pauillac, Saint-Estèphe, and Saint-Julien, are quite well known. Minor Bordeaux districts with appellations include Blaye, Bourg, Entre-Deux-Mers, and Premières Côtes de Bordeaux. There are over fifty individual appellations in Bordeaux, and, generally, the smallest ACs produce the highest-quality wines. There are also thousands of individual châteaux—some are quite impressive, while others are simply tiny farmhouses. This number has resulted in attempts at classifying the better châteaux in addition to using appellations as a quality guide. At the top of the list sit the cru classé (classed growths) whose classifications are, for the most part, quite old and frequently raise questions regarding the accuracy of the rankings in today’s environment. For example, the 1855 Official Classification of Bordeaux divided the crus classés for the Médoc red wines into five subcategories—premier cru (first growth) through cinquième cru (fifth growth)—and the white wines of Sauternes into two subcategories—premier cru (first growth) and deuxièmes cru (second growth). The quality of the wines from châteaux ranked in the second through fifth growths has changed over the years, but there hasn’t been any official classification change. However, the first growth châteaux—Haut-Brion, Lafite-Rothschild, Latour, Margaux, and Mouton-Rothschild (added in 1973)—have continued to maintain their standards for high quality (and high prices). Over the years, additional cru classé classifications were declared for other areas like Graves and Saint-Émilion. Today there are fewer than 200 châteaux classified as crus classés, and the Pomerol district châteaux have never been classified. This has not deterred wine lovers from seeking out the higher-quality wines—Pomerol’s château Pétrus is consistently one of the most desired and expensive of all Bordeaux wines. Below the cru classé ranking is another grouping of classifications called cru bourgeois, which ranks several hundred better Bordeaux châteaux not included in the cru classé. Below this are thousands of châteaux of lesser stature grouped together as petits château (the categories of cru artisan and cru Paysan are no longer commonly used). The primary red-grape varieties used in Bordeaux are Cabernet Sauvignon, Cabernet Franc, Merlot, and occasionally Malbec and Petit Verdot. In fact, it may surprise many American enophiles to learn that Merlot has almost twice as much acreage as Cabernet Sauvignon. Sauvignon Blanc, Sémillon, and Muscadelle are the primary white grapes. Bordeaux winemakers tend to blend grape varieties when making their wines, as opposed to the most common practice in the United States of making varietal wines. It should be noted that winemakers in the United States are now making more blended wines, coining the term Meritage for those comprised of the approved Bordeaux grape varieties. In general, the vineyards of Saint-Émilion and Pomerol are planted more heavily in Merlot and thus produce softer, more supple wines, whereas the vineyards of Médoc and Graves favor the Cabernet varieties and produce more intense, tannic, and long-lived wines.