Bordeaux 2008 at Four Years
The 2008 Bordeaux vintage is one I have covered extensively on Winedoctor over the past few years, not inappropriately I feel considering the relative value it could offer (or should that be ‘could have offered’?) compared to the two vintages that followed. In what is probably a final look back the vintage for some time (I may come back to it in maturity, but I have nothing planned for the next few years), I report here on my most recent assessment of the vintage, made during a tasting of the wines held at the Institute of Masters of Wine in London in November 2012.
As always with such tastings it is good to have some context. Thinking back for a moment to the first encounter with any vintage, the primeurs assessment, it would be a foolhardy visitor to Bordeaux who did not equip him/herself with some knowledge of the growing season, as – at that time – it is the best guide as to what a taster should expect. Some awareness of which communes suffered most with the rain during flowering, or which estates were hit by hail just a few days before picking, for example, are essential pieces of information, and you can be sure that the more spin-conscious among the Bordelais will ‘forget’ to include such unfavourable titbits in their fiche technique for the vintage. In fact, some of them are renowned for it, weaving endless tales of unbelievable wonder which, sadly, serve only to alienate the ever-more savvy Bordeaux-buying public. If only some of the more cantankerous offenders could see that.
