Grand Enclos du Château de Cérons
Blanc Sec 2004, A.C. Graves Blanc Sec **HERITAGE WINE** Color:
intense yellow with green.
Nose: expressive,
fresh, spicy, vanilla, (oak), fruity (citrus, apples), with minerals,
flowers, a touch of smoke and tobacco, some complexity, creamy, very
nice ripeness, good depth and very clean in style. Taste:
dry, very fresh, with great intensity, some richness, some alcohol,
powerful, beautiful refreshing acidity, nice intense fruit, minerals,
spices, very well integrated wood, excellent balance, excellent
cleanliness, good structure and uplifting mineral intensity. Finish:
quite long, with obvious wood, some alcohol, excellent refreshing
acidity, good intensity, power, clean and with excellent balance.
*
This is a textbook luxurious white dry Graves. This wine has great
freshness, excellent balance, very good intensity and power, has very
clean impressions of fruit, minerals and a nice touch of spicy
wood. Good Graves are never cheap, but this wine is well worth its
money and shows the potential of the vineyard and winemaker.
-
Ready to drink now, will
keep
a few more years, but I doubt if it will increase in complexity,
besides, it now is so deliciously balanced, you do not need to wait
much longer.
Dry
white Graves are not so popular as their red brothers. I must admit I
have tasted many uninteresting white specimens from this region.
Producers tend to concentrate on red in this part of Bordeaux, because
perhaps consumers / winecritics are concentrating on red wines.
This wine shows what a pitty it is not more producers of dry white
Graves have chosen to follow the "quality route". This wine is quite
unique in its character. It is hard to find a very similar wine from
elsewhere in the world. The elegance and mineral style combined with
the very good intensity is very specifically Bordeaux. We seem to have
lost that knowledge. Oaked Chardonnay is the norm now. Rediscover
this identity and the potential for producing white wines in Graves.
Let me be frank and honest on this wine: it is
produced from a very good vineyard, but not a top terroir. Therefore it
lacks the complexity of the big names, its lacks the depth and
impressive nuances of the top Cru's of the Graves, but this wine is
heading towards very high quality and both the vineyard manager aswell
as the winemaker have succeeded in extracting all available quality
from the grapes and vineyard and transfer it into this beautiful
wine. This is what more Bordelais should do with their precious
terroir.
- lotnr.: L 001 - tasted: 09-11-’07 - estimated retail price
ca. 12,00 euro - production: - Grand Enclos du Château de Cérons, 33720 Cérons, Francis Unique, export manager, tel: +33 5 56 27 01 53 ; mob: +33 613 590 649 ; fax: +33 5 56 27 08 86 ; e-mail: funique.grandenclos@orange.fr