Bordeaux 2016 Primeurs: Primeur Picks
In terms of quality, the 2016 vintage seems to have lived up to my pre-primeur hopes and expectations. The Bordelais thought in June 2016 that they might have another 2013 (i.e. a disaster) on their hands, but by the time the fruit was coming in at harvest, after four months of wonderfully warm, dry and sunny weather, it was clear to many that this wasn’t the case. The 2016 vintage turned out to be something quite exceptional. Not just a ‘saved’ vintage like 2014, a year marked by an unfavourable summer but dry and sunny autumn weather, one which gave us many good wines but which I feel are often a little too lean and light to be thought of as top drawer. No, 2016 has turned out to be a truly excellent vintage, one that deserves to be ranked among some of the very best for the region. That, I suppose, is the difference between the four months of warm and sunny weather that ultimately defined the 2016 growing season, and the six-week Indian-Summer-afterthought that lifted the 2014 vintage out of the doldrums.
Of equal importance to Bordeaux acolytes, though, is style. We can all rattle off the recent great vintages – 2005, 2009, 2010 – but while their standing seems unquestioned, nobody who has tasted them would try to argue that the wines of this capital trio have the same style. The wines of 2010 are powerhouses ready to knock you out in two punches, blow number one from the tannin, jab number two from its acidity, while 2009 is soft, plush and seductive, its structure buried deep under a creamed-fruit texture. They are the boxer and the seductress. And as for 2005 this vintage is defined by its balance, the fruit, texture, tannin and acidity all working together in harmony. It is I think the most ‘complete’ vintage of this high-quality trio, not so much Muhammad Ali or Mata Hari, more like Rudolf Nureyev at his most accomplished, or Herbert von Karajan in full flow, or maybe both together, a symphony of taut sinew.
And what of 2016? Most in Bordeaux, when asked to liken the style of this vintage to another, could not provide an answer. There were some who placed it in a twosome with 2015, and then drew comparisons between the 2015-2016 pairing and the duumvirate of 2009 and 2010. While this has some validity, because the two pairings are both defined by their contrasting styles, 2016 is certainly not the new 2010. I was slightly surprised nobody likened it to the more balanced 2005, or perhaps the classically styled wines of the left bank in 1996, because this is certainly a vintage of balance, the textures and structures washed over with fresh acidity, giving the wines a poise and precision which made this year’s primeur tastings the easiest and most enjoyable week of Bordeaux barrel samples I can ever recall (and I have done quite a few now). Personally I like the 1996-left-bank analogy, because as well as communicating a sense of balance and classicism, a return to a style we all thought long-lost, it also encapsulates a very significant feature of the 2016 vintage, which is the dramatically lower levels of alcohol that predominate. It was rare to encounter a wine over 14% this year, the majority comfortably below 13.9%, even down to Château Cos d’Estournel at 13.06%.
