Beychevelle, Rouget, Armailhac, Chevalier
Bordeaux primeurs campaigns often falter at the beginning. This one's a little different in that it's continuing to falter into the middle stage.
This week's seen the final Sauternes releases. Rieussec and Suduiraut have both made fine 2017s but, for my money, the Barsac trio of Coutet, Doisy-Daene and Doisy-Vedrines are simply miles better value.
Wednesday saw the release of two big names in St-Julien. Whatever you might think of Beychevelle's prominent new, glass-walled winery building, it hosted the UGC tasting for the appellation in fine style and their 2017 showed very well. The wine has a strong following in Asia and the release price makes it the cheapest vintage on the market, stoking demand among buyers. Heading west, Talbot is now under the capable direction of Jean-Michel Laporte, formerly manager of Pomerol's Conseillante. It's been overlooked in recent vintages but should now be one to watch.
Yesterday saw the release of Rouget and Clinet. The former now appears to be one of the better buys in Pomerol. Bought by the Labruyere family in 1992 (who also own Domaine Jacques Prieur in Burgundy) in 1992, the vineyards are in conversion to biodynamics and (unusually) a significant portion of the fruit is whole-cluster fermented. The 2017 displays opulent fruit with fine-grained tannins and good underlying structure and power and shows great promise. This morning we have the (Lafite) Rothschilds' L'Evangile but customers looking for Pomerol at this level will be better waiting for the release of the Thienponts' Vieux Chateau Certan.
From the same Rothschilds came Duhart-Milon yesterday afternoon and then this morning, Armailhac and Clerc Milon from the Baron Philippe/Mouton-Rothschild stable. All three properties have made good wines in 2017 and Armailhac, in particular, is beginning to look good value in the context of this campaign.
Yesterday also saw the release of one of the finest whites of the vintage, Domaine de Chevalier. Olivier Bernard has made a very good red Chevalier but it's unfortunate that the exchange rate makes the sterling release price higher than the 2015's.
Our table below details the week's other releases. Some of these would normally merit special attention but the combination of release price and exchange rate is against them. /AR
Offered subject to remaining unsold; available 2020
