Bordeaux 2011 at Four Years: Pauillac
After the ebullient and confident wines of St Estèphe I moved on to taste the wines of Pauillac. The appellations are directly contiguous, and it is only a one-minute drive from Château Cos d’Estournel to Château Lafite-Rothschild, nevertheless there was something different about the wines of this commune compared to those further north.
Compared to the bolder style found to the north, here in Pauillac the character of the wines seemed rather less self-assured. In previous tastings the fruit character has always been a mix of red and also darker fruits throughout the appellation, an indicator of the complexity of the vintage. Here the some of the wines showing a more red-fruit character had a rather more pointed and crisp style, with more redcurrant and red cherry notes. In addition, the fruit seemed stretched a little thin in some cases. This hasn’t really been a major feature of the vintage so far, in this appellation at least. It seems to me that these wines are in a rather awkward phase at the moment.
There has always been a difference in quality between these two neighbouring appellations in this vintage, but this withdrawal of fruit and texture in Pauillac seemed to accentuate these distinctions at this tasting. In a number of cases I have noticed that I have scored the wines a half-point lower than on previous occasions. This seemed to be true across the board, except for one or two big names. I expect, given time, that the wines will bounce back though. The only way to be sure is to taste again in the future, so I look forward to checking them out when they are ten years old to see if this prediction comes true.
