Bordeaux 2015 at Two Years: St Julien
Travelling southwards along the Médoc peninsula, it is in St Julien that we find the last of the great communal appellations to have been significantly hit by the September rain in the 2015 vintage. The rainfall here was comparable to what it was in Pauillac, typically about 70 mm during the course of the month, but again some vineyards took more, as much as 100 mm in some cases. As with Pauillac, 70 mm is actually below average, but 100 mm is well above it. Perhaps more important is the fact that it mostly came concentrated in the space of a week or two, just prior to harvest, which no doubt accentuated its effect.
As a consequence the story in St Julien is again, like Pauillac, one of muted variability. At the top end there are some exceptionally fine wines here. There are no first growths, of course, but there are several châteaux performing at the super-second level. These top-ranking châteaux possess some superb waterside gravel terroirs which should cope very well with a little extra rain, and judging by the quality of the wine it would seem that is exactly what they did. On the other hand, at the bottom end there are a number of much less convincing wines which, like some of their peers in Pauillac, have a rather ‘ordinary’ feel to them.
The Wines
While the 2015s from Château Ducru-Beaucaillou and Château Léoville-Las-Cases are far from the greatest wines from these châteaux I have encountered over the last fifteen years of tasting and reviewing young Bordeaux, they are both exceptionally smart wines. The former, tasted with maître de chai Benoît Loiseau (pictured) has a velvety confidence and great grip, shrugging off any thoughts of difficulties in this appellation as easily as the gravelly terroir no doubt shrugged off the rain. The latter is just one of a number of smart wines in the appellation in this vintage, similarly velvety, with finely concentrated fruit character. The waterside gravel here coped just as well, although it was perhaps not as challenged as some, the Las Cases vineyards receiving a below-average quantity of rain during September.
