2010 Bordeaux en primeur preliminary report

12/04/11

2010 Bordeaux: another beauty

Last Tuesday, at Leoville-Barton, Anthony Barton welcomed us to taste his latest two vintages, 'each one better than the other', he joked. Like '89 and '90 - but no other pair in modern times - we have another beauty in the barrel, side by side, shoulder to shoulder, with its illustrious predecessor. After a week of tasting, we can't be sure that 2010 Bordeaux will surpass 2009 - each has its own distinct character. They will be fascinating to compare as they develop in barrel and then in bottle. In the end it will probably come down to individual chateaux - and individual taste.

I shan't cover in detail here all of the year's weather events - for that there's no better source than Bill Blatch's coverage on jancisrobinson.com. And for a detailed discussion of the effects we recommend Jean-Marc Quarin's first report of 1 April (quarin.com). Suffice to say that 2010 is not a vintage defined by warmth like '82, '89, '90, '05 or '09 - let alone '03. If anything, its character is defined by the drought (Haut-Brion told us it was the driest vintage since '49). But although it was dry, the vine never suffered too much stress, thanks to plentiful rain in both winter and mid-June. Poor flowering and uneven fruit set naturally reduced yields which may otherwise have been problematically high. A warm July accelerated the build-up of sugar levels. And then dry and cool conditions in August and September shrank the grapes whilst preserving the acidity. Slow ripening meant a late harvest, despite sugar levels already being high.

The stage was set for an impressive performance. Alcohol, sugar, tannins and colour broke all records they said at Haut-Brion, and acidity levels were close to record. To try and compare such a singular vintage with earlier years may be a futile exercise. Producers we spoke to were more than usually reluctant to provide a comparison, and their answers varied considerably:

Haut-Bailly - Unctuosity of 2009/precision of 2008/power of 2005
Brane-Cantenac - 2005 (but more fruit expression)
Cos d'Estournel - 1986/2005 (with more weight & fat) or 1959
Margaux - 1996 (but a modern version)
Lynch-Bages & Sociando-Mallet - 1990
Leoville-Poyferre - 1975 (but riper)
Vieux Certan - 1950
Palmer - 1929

Geographically, too, it isn't easy to categorise the vintage. Whilst the left bank is undoubtedly host to a number of profound wines, and Cabernet would seem best suited to the dry conditions, Twitter musings suggest that Pomerol's Vieux Chateau Certan is one of the favourite wines of the vintage. In 2010 that comprises 86% Merlot. If we were to make any generalisations, we would say that Margaux seemed unusually successful as did St-Estephe - although that may be because we didn't expect them to be. And it's not just about the reds: the dry whites were a great success and the sweet wines, too (Berenice Lurton said Climens will be at least the equal of her sublime 2007). Perhaps the best advice we can give is as simple as to buy the wines you normally like. Disappointments were few and far between, and we don't recall a single one from any of our favourite properties. Though perhaps lacking the transparency of, say, 2008, the wines are much less marked by the character of the vintage than were the 2009s, so the top wines should reflect beautifully the characters which traditionally define them.

Unsurprisingly, confidence is running high among Bordeaux proprietors. They will be gauging the excitement and consulting their agents. 'The market will decide the prices,' they told us at Chateau Margaux, before adding 'the Chinese market,' without a hint of irony. Luckily for the rest of us that market is obsessed with only a handful of properties.

It's interesting to draw parallels between these last few vintages and the corresponding ones of two decades ago. At the St-Estephe/St-Julien/Pauillac Union des Grands Crus tasting at Branaire-Ducru on Thursday, the temperature in the tasting room hit 35C. Outside, visitors from around the world took a break between appointments on deckchairs in the sun. At Chateau Biac, our home for the week, the agricultural engineer rang to say the weather reminded him of 1991. Is the pattern set to continue? /AR

Offered subject to confirmation for shipment 2013

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