On the wine trail
In the light of the recent VINEXPO held in Bordeaux, Eugene Bacot looks back at the history of this world-renowned wine growing region, and envisages the growth of the industry
2008-10-12
Elegant Bordeaux, the world capital of wine and recently named a World Heritage Site by Unesco for the quality of the city's monuments and architectural style around the port., plays host every two years to more than 50,000 wine connoisseurs, producers, buyers, retailers, sommeliers, distillers, journalists and business people from every corner of the globe. Their destination is VINEXPO, the world’s biggest international wine and spirits exhibition.
For five days in June this year Bordeaux hummed with the buying and selling of wine, fine spirits and liqueurs; and, naturally, lots of sniffing and swilling, networking and handshaking
The cobbled quays and smart restaurants of Bordeaux were crowded with visitors from more than 140 countries. Wine makers from New Zealand, South Africa, Chile, Argentina and California, as well as the reviving wine regions of eastern Europe, demonstrated why the 21st century is a golden age for the grape.
Business people from the booming economies of India, China and the Far East were present to both buy and sell. These newly-enriched countries have not only developed a taste for drinking wine, wine makers in the region of Shandong, near Beijing, or cool, hilly Bangalore in southern India are now growing classic grape varieties such as Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot.
Wine is big business and the world has an insatiable thirst for making and consuming it. By 2010 total world wine production will be worth $300bn forecasts VINEXPO. Nor should eaux de vie and liqueurs be forgotten because VINEXPO is also the world’s biggest exhibition for spirits.
Masterminding the huge VINEXPO operation is Robert Beynat, General Manager, who exemplifies the jet set life. His travels each year take him from the Far East to Australia, USA and Eastern Europe. “Above all this is a global exhibition; it is not French or European”, insists Mr Beynat. “This is where the wine industry meets to do business.”
Yet this frantic business is a dramatic contrast to the languid style and aristocratic elegance of Bordeaux, home of claret, as the British have long called the red wine from the right and left banks of the Gironde estuary, the Dordogne and the Garonne rivers (see box)
Deep in the flat, leafy lanes of the Medoc, or the undulating terrain of St Emilion or Fronsac, the honey coloured stone and blue-slate, steepled roofs of picture book chateaux glow in the June sunlight surrounded by ranks of vines like marching armies
The vineyards are dominated by five major grape varieties: merlot, cabernet sauvignon and cabernet franc for red wine; sauvignon blanc for dry white wine and semillon for the famous and long lasting sweet white wines of Sauternes and Barsac.
Exploring this countryside mosaic of chateaux, woods, quiet villages and small family-run restaurants, could be bewildering. Luckily, the Bordeaux wine growers’ organisation has created a guide which divides the region into five ‘routes du vin’. (see Box)
Back in Bordeaux, a face lift, as well as a cheap and efficient new tram system, has rejuvenated the City. Tall 18th century houses on the riverside Quai des Chartrons - where until comparatively recently wine merchants matured and bottled claret in vast cellars - have been cleaned to reveal remarkable, sculpted façades. Narrow streets behind the river front, many of them almost slums 20 years ago, have suddenly bloomed into pretty areas for strolling among beautiful buildings.
Nearby is one of the most remarkable squares in Europe, the Esplanade des Quinconces and the monument to the Girondins - liberal republicans who became both leaders and victims of the French revolution. At the base of the monument huge bronze horses leap through spume and spray from the fountains. Nearby are statues to two of the City’s most famous sons: the philosophers and writers Michel de Montaigne and Charles Louis de Montesquieu. Both men were not only intellectuals but wine growers too.
The wine that has made Bordeaux great is everywhere. The welcoming Maison du Vin in the cour XXX Juillet, reminds us of the vast range of Bordeaux wines. But also that the Bordelais are fighting hard to keep their world markets and to maintain the quality of Bordeaux wines. The layout and tasting rooms of the Maison du Vin are a perfect example of traditional style and poise contrasted with the a new approach to wine discovery. Tasting plates of local cheeses with very affordable glasses of local wines are not to be missed.
The global character of VINEXPO and Bordeaux is also expressed in the Jury Découvertes, one of the high points of the exhibition in which 16 sommeliers and journalists from as far afield as Finland and Argentina, select their choice of the best wines on show. They have total freedom. They only criterion is that the wine should be new and exciting for the discoverers. The three top Grand Prix winners are decided by a blind tasting.
Their choice was truly international. The top red wine was De Loach 2005, a Pinot Noir from Sonoma in California, made by the French producer Boisset. The top rosé was Santa Digna 2007, made from Cabernet Sauvignon grapes in Chile and produced by Miguel Torres, a Spanish winemaker. The only solely European wine was the white Nelin 2005, made from the very fashionable Priorat grape in Spain by Close Mogador. Unusually, a cask of Pedro Ximenes sherry had been added to the vat.
You could say that touch of the unexpected is a metaphor for the new spirits of adventure of Bordeaux and VINEXPO.
BOX OUT ONE
On the grapevine
The poet John Keats wrote: “How I like claret. It fills one’s mouth with a gushing freshness, then goes down to cool and feverless; then, you do not feel it quarrelling with one’s liver. No; ‘tis rather a peace-maker, and lies as quiet as it did in the grape. Then it is as fragrant as the Queen Bee, and the more ethereal part mounts into the brain, not assaulting the cerebral apartments, like a bully looking for his trull, and hurry from door to door, bouncing against the wainscot, but rather walks like Aladdin about his enchanted palace, so gently that you do not feel his step.
When preparing the famous 1855 classification of Bordeaux wines for the 1855 World’s Fair in Paris, the jury remarked: “The wine of Bordeaux give tone to the stomach, while leaving the mouth fresh and the head clear. More than one invalid abandoned by the doctors has been seen to drink the good old wine of Bordeaux and return to health.
BOX OUT TWO
The five routes du vin take in most of the 57 Bordeaux appellations, from the aristocratic chateaux of the Medoc to classic sweet wines of Sauternes and Barsac
1. La Route des Chateaux – a short drive north from Bordeaux between the Atlantic and the Gironde estuary, plunges the visitor into the heart of the Grands Crus Classés of the 1855 classification and numerous Crus Bourgeois.
2. La Route des Coteaux – take the ferry from Pauillac to the right bank appellations of Blaye and Bourg. Strategic positioning over estuary shipping explains why armies have built fortification here, from the Romans to the magnificent strong point designed and built by Vaubon, Louis XlV’s master military engineer.
3. La Route du Patrimoine – head south along the right bank of the estuary to the Dordogne tributary and the sumptuous wines of Pomerol, Fronsac, St Emilion and its satellites. Continue along the river to the up-and-coming appellations of Côtes de Castillon and Côtes de Francs.
4. La Route des Bastides – This vast wine growing region between the Dordogne and Garonne runs south west inland to Montsegur and St Foy La- Grange. Bastides refers to the ‘new’ walled towns build in the 13th and 14 centuries by the English and French. It produces a versatile range of wines from deep reds to light reds ‘clairet’ and sweet wines of Sainte-Croix du ~Mont.
5. La Route des Graves – at the gates of Bordeaux is Pessac Léognan, the only appellation outside the Medoc with an 1855 cru classes chateau. (Chateau Haut Brion). The chateau of Montesquieu is at La Brède. On the branks of the Ciron river are honeyed Sauternes and Barsac.
ENDS
