Château Cissac: Tasting & Drinking
As I wrote in my introduction, Château Cissac seems to have more than its fair share of fans among the British wine trade. And this, in part I think, harks back to the presence the wine had on the British wine market during the 1960s and 1970s. The wine is also undeniably left-bank Bordeaux in character, with a firm and somewhat austere house style that may not have won over many friends on first sip, but which clearly gave a lot of people a lot of pleasure.
In my own early experiences with Château Cissac I seemed to encounter a wine at perhaps did not deserve such adulation. Yes it was dry, classically formed, and austere, none of which are necessarily negative features. But I also found it to have some rather hard edges, with nothing to cushion the impact of the structure, the overall effect therefore lacking a little in charm. I was sometimes left scratching my head as to the legion of fans the wine seemed to possess.
Nevertheless, in recent years, I sense a slight softening of the style. The wines have not done an about-face, for they still have that firm structure, but Marie Vialard has a stated aim to make the wines in a style that is a little more approachable when young, while still being imbued with a good potential for aging. That usually means working on the quality of the tannins, and the texture of the fruit, and both show nicely in recent times. This is now a wine I look forward to tasting, even if I have yet to join its legion of acolytes stacking away case after case in the cellar. (4/2/16)
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