Bordeaux 2011 at Four Years: Pessac-Léognan
Graves is a huge region, one that even with annual visits to Bordeaux, not infrequently two or three visits during the course of a year, I feel have barely scratched the surface of. Even if we home in on the superior Pessac-Léognan appellation, as here, there is still much ground to cover. After all, most domaines in Bordeaux have one grand vin, and maybe a second wine which only a minority of châteaux will bother to pour for you.
Here, however, at most domaines there are white wines as well as red. That makes any visit to the region quite an undertaking. These days, when tasting at Château Haut-Brion, you have to be careful not to knock any of the cornucopia of glasses off the tasting table. You have the two reds, and the two whites. And then there are the wines of Château La Mission Haut Brion too, again white as well as red. These are followed by the wines of Château Quintus, their estate in St Emilion. I always schedule an hour for my visit here.
This tasting, however, is based not on a visit to the region. As I have already explained in my introduction, these wines were tasted at the Institute of Masters of Wine annual Bordeaux tasting. The tasting focuses on dry red wines (although these days Sauternes and Barsac are also included), and only a handful of châteaux contributed wines. As a consequence we have a seriously curtailed showing from the appellation here, with just half a dozen wines. As you might expect with the Institute of Masters of Wine, however, the quality of the offering more than made up for the quantity.
