2016 Fete du Bordeaux

On January 12, 2017 By Bob WattIn FranceLeave a comment

As we head into the new year, we were stunned to realize that it’s almost time for one of our favorite wine events! Having made our New Year’s resolution to post more, we’ll start by catching up with an update from last year’s Fete du Bordeaux.

The Fete du Bordeaux always comes around in January just after the holidays. It is not just a chance to taste the new releases from Bordeaux, but a chance to visit with the people who represent and/or own the Chateaux, many of whom we have gotten to know over the past ten years. It is always good to catch up with them and hear about what is going on in Bordeaux.

Bob Watt, Christina Watt and Jean-Charles Cazes from Lynch Bages…our annual photo. Will be fun to look back on all of these one day!

There have been so many amazing changes that have taken place in the wineries throughout Bordeaux over the last 5 to 6 years and their wines are the better for it. While there were many great wines produced in Bordeaux through the 80’s and 90’s, they pale in some respects to the quality that is being produced in Bordeaux today. Today’s technology, like optical sorters and satellite imagery, were only dreams of the past. Combine this with more rigorous vineyard management and stricter quality standards, and the end result for consumers and collectors is consistently better wines – even in less than outstanding vintages.

This year’s Fete du Bordeaux was again held at the restaurant One Market in San Francisco and was a tasting of the new 2013 releases:

2013 Chateau Langoa Barton, St. Julien

2013 Chateau Leoville Barton, St. Julien

2013 Chateau Lynch Bages, Pauillac

2013 Chateau Ormes de Pez, St. Estephe

2013 Chateau Figeac, St. Emilion

2013 Petit Figeac, St. Emilion

2013 Chateau La Conseillante, Pomerol

Christina and I visited Bordeaux in 2013 during the harvest. I can tell you that it was not ideal weather for the end of the growing season or harvest, with fairly frequent rain showers throughout the region. Unfortunately, the wines of 2013 also show the difficulty of the growing season that the winemakers had to work with. While the growing season of 2013 may have produced poor wines if they had been made in the 70’s or 80’s, today’s improved vineyard technology and winemaking practices produced some very pleasant wines. The 2013’s are not the big blockbuster wines of 2005, 2009 or 2010, but you won’t have to wait as long for them to mature either.

The wine of the flight for the 2013’s was the newcomer to the group, Chateau La Conseillante. Michel Rolland is the consulting winemaker for Chateau La Conseillante and the wine is made from 80% Merlot and 20% Cab. Franc. This is a very nice wine for the vintage, medium bodied, with elegant dark fruit and fairly fine tannins on the medium long finish. (92 pts.)

As we moved into the main dining room of the restaurant, we had a nice glass of Champagne from Franck Bonville – Grand Cru Blanc de Blancs NV. I have had this particular Champagne on several occasions and I have always enjoyed it. It reminds me of Salon in style, but slightly smaller in stature. It is creamy in texture with good acidity, white fruit, green apple, lemon and a chalky mineral streak running right through the medium-long finish. This is definitely a great QPR champagne at $35. (90 pts.)

To start the dinner off we tasted the 2014 Blanc de Lynch Bages white Bordeaux, which is produced in small batches. I have always enjoyed this wine throughout the years, and it is one of my wife’s favorite whites. It is very crisp with honey dew melon, green apples, lemon and a slight stoniness on the nice clean finish. It is a perfect wine for summer if you can find it. (92 pts.)

To go with our grilled calamari salad and roasted duck dinner, we had two flights of four wines:

2005 Chateau Figeac, St. Emilion – Dark red/black fruit with a slight green pepper nose. Nice dark fruit with good acidity, a hint of spice, medium bodied and a medium long dark fruit finish. (92 pts.)

2005 Chateau La Conseillante, Pomerol – Very dark bing cherry and blackberry fruit nose. Very dark fruit in the mouth, lively acidity, and very fine tannins. Nice long dark cherry fruit finish. This wine is already very elegant and still on the young side, with upside potential. This wine has a long life ahead of it. (95+ pts.)

2005 Chateau Langoa Barton, St. Julien – Ripe red cherries and some black fruit on the nose. In the mouth, red cherries and black currant, decent acidity, but a little monolithic at this point on the medium long cherry fruit finish. Maybe this just needs more time in the bottle. (90 pts.)

2005 Chateau Lynch Bages, Pauillac – Dark fruit and a little autumn leaves on the nose. Nice dark bing cherry, some blackberry and a little walnut in the mouth. Very nice acidity keeps this lively in the mouth, while the dark fruit continues on to a nice medium-long finish. While there is still a fair amount of tannin here to work out, the wine is still young and should be good for the long haul. (94+ pts.)

2000 Chateau Figeac, St. Emilion – Ripe dark red fruit on the nose. In the mouth, red currants and cherries, with slightly grainy tannins and not quite as concentrated as the 2005. Finishes with nice red cherry fruit of medium length. (92 pts.)

2000 Chateau La Conseillante, Pomerol – Black currants and blackberries on the nose. In the mouth a mixture of black currants and dark bing cherry/blackberry pie. Good acidity and some spice notes starting to show up. Again the elegance comes through on the medium-long dark fruit finish. Still young, but this wine is starting to show a little of what it has in store for the patient collector. (94 pts.)

1995 Chateau Lynch Bages, Pauillac – Ripe dark red fruit and a little forest floor on the nose. In the mouth, black cherries and red currants combine with roasted nuts and some spice. Soft in the mouth with a little tannin still present. Nice acidity and sweet dark fruit carry through to the medium-long finish. (93 pts.)

1995 Chateau Leoville Barton, St. Juilen – Nose of the night, with red and black fruit, forest floor and baking spices. In the mouth, nice sweet dark cherries, red currants and some blackberry combine with grilled nuts and forest floor. This has good acidity and is very silky in the mouth. Very nice sweet dark fruit on the long finish. (95 pts.)

For dessert, we had a pear brown butter tart and a wine to go with:

2007 Chateau Suduiraut, Sauternes – Nice and light melon, tangerine and a touch of honey on the nose. Good fruit in the mouth, melon, pears and some bees wax. Decent acidity with a hint of spice on the medium-long sweet honey finish. (92 pts.)

It was another wonderful evening spent with friends from afar. While I may not be buying a large quantity of wine from the 2013 vintage, there were some good wines made that you could enjoy while you are waiting for the 05’s, 09’s and 10’s to come to maturity.

Next year, the wines of 2014 should be a noticeable step up over the 13’s. We look forward to the next tasting in just a few short weeks!

Better Late than Never: 2015 Bordeaux Fete in San Francisco

On August 3, 2015August 3, 2015 By Bob WattIn FranceLeave a comment

It has been a busy year! We are so far behind in our blog, but have every intention of making up for lost time.

To start, here’s the recap we have to add from last January’s (gasp!) Annual Bordeaux Fete. We need to get this down for the record before next year rolls around in a few short months!

Bob Watt, Christina Watt, Jean-Charles Cazes from Lynch Bages and Nancy Rugas from Chateau Suduiraut.

I was very happy to be able to go this year, as I missed last year. This year, Christina and I attended the one put on by K & L Wine Merchants and the participating Chateaux in San Francisco, since we had just moved to the Bay area. The Bordeaux Fete was at One Market Restaurant and we tasted the new 2012 releases from:

Ch. Langoa Barton, St. Julien

Ch. Leoville Barton, St. Julien

Ch. Ormes de Pez, St. Estephe

Ch. Lynch Bages, Pauillac

Petit Figeac, St. Emilion

Ch. Figeac, St. Emilion

The 2012’s while not in the same league (or price) as the 2009’s or 2010’s, they are good in their own right. The 2012’s are medium bodied with good fruit/acid/structure and will be good to drink while you are waiting for your 2010’s to mature in your cellar. These wines will be a pleasure to drink in the near-mid term, particularly with food.

This is always a fun event to taste the new wines and talk with the Chateaux proprietors that we have gotten to know over the years. This year in addition to Jean-Charles Cazes from Ch. Lynch Bages and Lilian Barton-Sartorius from Ch. Leoville Barton, the event included Chateau Figeac, with proprietor Hortense Odoine Manoncourt. We had spent some time with Hortense at Chateau Figeac on our trip to Bordeaux and it was great to see her again.

The tasting format in San Francisco is a little different than what they do in Seattle. In San Francisco, they set up three tables with all of the new release wines being poured by the proprietors and you get to taste them over an hour time period. After tasting the new releases, we were given a glass of non-vintage Thienot Brut Champagne as we made our way to the dinner tables. Once at the dinner tables, the older wines were poured to enjoy with the food courses. Here are the other wines that we tasted with the meal:

2013 Blanc de Lynch Bages – Tangerine, lemon mineral nose. Very nice bright clean lemony white fruit, with a little stone mixed in. Lively acidity, smooth mouth feel, medium-light body. Nice long lemony energetic fruit finish. This is a very nice white Bordeaux wine that is only produced in smaller quantities, so it may not be easy to find, but is worth the effort. I will have to track some down for the cellar. 93 pts.

2009 Figeac – Ripe black/red berry fruit nose. This wine is lush with sweet black/red fruit, some spice and a little forest floor. There is good acidity to the wine, medium-full bodied with lots of very fine ripe tannins (iron fist in velvet glove). It is nice to taste a right bank right wine if a field of left banks, just for comparison. This is a very nice wine from a great vintage. 93 pts.

2005 Langoa Barton – Subtle nose of red / black fruit. In the mouth crunchy dark red and black berries, hints of forest floor and tobacco, with bright acidity. Nice medium – long dark fruit finish. 91 pts.

2005 Lynch Bages – This wine has a suave nose of spicy dark cherry fruit. In the mouth, the rich sweet dark black/red cherry fruit combines with baking spices and just a hint of leather. The wine has very nice acidity and very fine ripe tannins. The wine has great balance to it and a very long sweet spicy dark fruit finish. This wine is still very young, but is just starting to show what it has in store for a very long future. The 2005 Lynch Bages can be enjoyed now with air time, but will reward further cellaring. It wine will gain even more complexity as it is still on the uphill climb to maturity. Drink now or over the next three decades. 95+ pts.

2003 Figeac – Very ripe red and black fruit nose. In the mouth, very ripe dark red bing cherry and black berries, decent acidity, with a very tannic fine grained structure. Medium – long very ripe dark fruit finish. Over the course of the evening, the wine seemed to lose some of it’s acidity that supported the very ripe fruit. I would drink the 2003 sooner rather than later, over the next 10 years or so. 91 pts.

1995 Lynch Bages – Rich dark cherry fruit nose. In the mouth, plush sweet dark red / black fruit combine with forest floor and baking spices. This wine has good acidity, soft mostly resolved tannins and a long beautiful dark spicy fruit finish. The wine is drinking really well now and will continue to do so over the next 10-15 years. If you have some of the ’95 in the cellar, open one now and enjoy it. 94+ pts.

1999 Leoville Barton – Black cherry fruit and spice nose. In the mouth, very concentrated dark black cherries, spices and a little forest floor. Nice acidity, with some very fine grained ripe tannins still present. The wine has a very nice sense of balance, with a very long dark sweet black fruit finish. This wine is drinking really well right now, but I think it will continue to improve. 94+ pts.

2004 Suduiraut – Orangey-yellow in color, nose of very ripe fruit and butterscotch. In the mouth, again very ripe tropical fruit, over ripe melon, honey and butterscotch. This wine is too ripe for my taste, it doesn’t have the acid to back up the sweetness, so it comes across as heavy. Medium length very sweet finish. 82 pts.

It just so happened that the same day as the dinner, the Seattle Seahawks made the finals for the SuperBowl. Since Seattle was the next stop on the tour for our winemaker friends, we zipped into the city early to buy them a little something so they could show their support at their next dinner.

Jean-Charles Cazes of Cht. Lynch Bages, Christina Watt, and Lilian Barton- — Jean-Charles Cazes of Ch. Lynch Bages, Christina Watt, and Lilian Barton-Sartorius from Ch. Leoville Barton. They were very good sports about showing their Seahawks support!

Too bad the Seahawks didn’t pull through this year – but perhaps those hats will come in handy again next year! It will certainly be here before we know it…

Duck, Duck, Goose…Cooking Class at Phelan Segur

On October 15, 2013December 9, 2013 By Bob WattIn FranceLeave a comment

Authored by Christina Watt

Our first morning we drove up to St. Estephe to kick off the tour at Phelan Segur with a cooking class. We pulled up at the very impressive Chateau where we were greeted outside the door by the chef, Jimmy, carrying a basket of beautiful fresh produce. Over the course of the next two plus hours, we were treated to lessons by Chef Jimmy and translations by Edouard – oh, how we wished we had brushed up more on our French! But we all managed to work together to produce a beautiful meal.

We started off by learning how to make the traditional French cannele – little carmelized cakes with a custard-like center – oh my. They explained to us that what we had just learned to make was a very popular pastry that originated in Bordeaux – they were everywhere! (See the kitchn for a great cannele recipe and a little history on this tasty treat.)

Our first cannele. — Our first batch! We have to get some of those little molds at home…

While the cannele were baking, we began working on our homemade pastry crust for our duck pie. Turns out Bob has just the right precise and patient touch for making pastry dough. Me? Apparently I’m a little impatient, no surprise to those who know me well!

Bob and Jimmy working the pastry dough. — Bob and Chef Jimmy working the pastry dough.

In between turns of the dough, we prepared the duck. We seared the breasts with chopped vegetables and cooked the legs to get two different types of meat, and created a jus (sauce) using the rest of the duck remains. Chef Jimmy added wine to the pan to create the jus, lighting it with the flame from the stove. And then he looked at me to try it. I was convinced I would wind up with my hair on fire, but we managed to produce the necessary flame without incident. (Bob was ready for it though – he actually filmed this part in anticipation. He knows me too well.)

My first time... — Too much information? It was definitely a first for us!

Jus in the making. — A delicious jus in the making.

My eyes about popped out of my head when Chef Jimmy plunked down a big slab of foie gras – at 11:00 am in the morning, no less! From the smiles on our faces, he ascertained (correctly) that the we very much enjoyed foie, so he told me to cut three big slabs of it. Thinking he’d be searing it for some sort of appetizer, I happily complied. A short while later, I found myself placing those large slabs into the middle of our duck pies – clearly, a heart attack in the making!

I've died and gone to foie heaven. — I’ve died and gone to foie heaven.

Finally, we concocted a beautiful chocolate ganache, which I again attempted to hurry along – who knew it took so much finesse to get that chocolate to such a glossy state?

Bob concentrates on the dessert embellishments.

After a very informative and fun couple of hours in the kitchen, we enjoyed a tour with Edouard and a tasting with winemaker Fabrice Bacquey while Chef Jimmy put the finishing touches on our meal.