Bordeaux 2014 Primeurs: Pessac-Léognan
In a vintage such as 2014 the response of tasters when it comes to the white wines can be almost Pavlovian. What’s that, it was a cool vintage, you say? Oh well, it will be good for the white wines.
Everybody reading this already knows that in a cooler vintage while the red wines might struggle to loosen themselves from the acidic shackles of the growing season, for the white wines this simply isn’t a problem. We don’t mind acidity in white wines. Indeed we enjoy acidity in white wines. And 2014 is a vintage dominated by acidity, in every style; whether dry or sweet white, whether Cabernet- or Merlot-based red, one thing the wines all have in common is a rather obvious backbone of fresh acidity. I’m not surprised, therefore, to note that the white wines have come in for some praise from the trade and critics alike.
Let’s just consider this for a moment though. Does every cool vintage always give us top quality? Extrapolating from this suggestion and looking beyond the confines of Bordeaux for a moment, does every cool climate wine region, or every terroir deemed suitable for white varieties, give us brilliant white wines every year? No, the world of wine is of course more nuanced than this.
So before looking at how the season and harvest progressed at a number of top Pessac-Léognan domaines, let’s first consider some white wine generalities which I didn’t cover in my Bordeaux 2014 introduction.
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