Bordeaux 2017 at Two Years: Pessac-Léognan
In this frosted vintage it is not that difficult to create soundbite generalisations for the appellations of the left-bank (as traditionally defined, i.e. the vineyards of the Médoc peninsula) and right-bank (St Emilion, Pomerol and their friends and satellites). In the case of the former it was the proximity to the Gironde that mattered most, while in the case of the latter elevation mattered most, a position high up on the plateau of St Emilion, or close to the peak of the Pomerol slope, being as valuable (if not more so) than in any other recent vintage. Although there are good wines on both sides of the water, St Emilion and Pomerol probably produced more wines of really excellent quality than the vineyards running from St Estèphe down to Margaux, suggesting that elevation perhaps provides better insurance against frost than the waters of the Gironde could manage.
Where then, does this leave Graves and Pessac-Léognan, which have neither estuary nor elevation? The vineyards are situated a little way west of the Garonne, which flows north towards the city of Bordeaux, and while it surely has some effect it will never have the impact on its immediate environment that the Gironde, which is many kilometres wide, can have. And there is no elevation of note here; although the appellation encompasses several vineyards within the suburbs of the city which surely offers some protection from frost, the vineyards are mostly situated on the gently rolling landscape south of the suburbs, where some slopes were frosted, and some got away with it. Some vineyard managers reported just 10% loss after the frost, while others lost much more, some estates registering yields of just 20 hl/ha.
Pessac-Léognan is often overlooked by wine drinkers and even by the wine trade, a classic example being the 1998 vintage which was widely regarded as a ‘right-bank year’, a soundbite which drew an unwanted veil over the fact that the 1998 Pessac-Léognan wines were stunning, some of the best to come out of the region for close to a decade, trouncing those of the 1996 vintage which were often more highly regarded simply because that vintage had a ‘left-bank’ reputation. I have made efforts not to overlook this region over the years, especially so in this more difficult vintage, and I present here my notes on 29 wines, both white and red, from this appellation. I also have a handful of tasting notes on a few wines from Graves, which I have tagged on at the end.
