Tuesday 27 May

With Vinexpo Asia kicking off in Singapore today, we weren't expecting a lot of Bordeaux activity, but we were wrong! Brane-Cantenac is out, 'easily one of the wines of the vintage' in the words of Jane Anson. Uncorked agrees: we thought 2024 Brane-Cantenac was dramatically good. It’s lusciously mouthfilling, silky and salty, robed in floral fruit. It shrugs off the 80% new oak with tremendous elegance. Despite the travails of the vintage, Henri Lurton managed good yields here, after choosing to spray hard and early. He expressed surprise at the balance of wine: ‘I never had a vintage before where the skins were ripe but we had low alcohol with high acidity. It’s ripe and it’s fresh’. Brane has always been one of the top properties in the appellation. The 12-meter-deep gravel soils of the Plateau de Brane are one of the best terroirs in Margaux. The best vines here, and the backbone of the wine, are the 60+ year-old Cabernet Sauvignon vines planted by Henri’s father Lucien, after the great frost of 1956. 2024 Brane is released at £213/6, a 20% reduction on last year’s price and the cheapest Brane at release in a decade.

At St-Émilion property Grand Mayne, Jean-Antoine Nony has been finessing the style of this historic estate. A long-term replanting programme is aimed at returning the proportion of Cabernet Franc to what it was in his grandfather’s day (35%) both for reasons of soil suitability and as a hedge againt global warming. Currently, the vineyard is planted to 78% Merlot, 19% Cabernet Franc and 3% Cabernet Sauvignon, across higher clay-limestone soils (adjacent to Beau-Séjour Bécot) and the lower sandy-clay vineyards around the château. Stéphane Derenoncourt has recently replaced Michel Rolland as consultant here, reflecting a move towards prioritising elegance over power.

From Pessac, we have the Kressmann family’s Latour-Martillac. The rouge is delicate, with soft, fleshy fresh red fruits and smooth tannins. The cool conditions of 2024 have made an energetic white: the blanc is absolutely outstanding, tense and fresh, with lovely aromatics of citrus and nectarine.

For fans of ‘Allo ‘Allo, we also have the lovely and very good value, family-owned Pomerol Clos René.

Friday 23 May

Palmer has learned its lesson. Handling excess humidity and the fungal pressure that can bring is hard when you are following a completely biodynamic vineyard regime. In 2018, under mildew pressure, they lost most of their crop; this time round, they knew to double up treatments at the first sign of any trouble. The result would be a success in the context of any vintage, and is doubly so in 2024.

In St-Julien, fourth growth Saint-Pierre is out, priced £168/6, and in Margaux we have fifth growth du Tertre released at £156/6.

Thursday 22 May

Until recently, it was Léoville Las Cases, but it has now officially slimmed down its name to Las Cases. Be that as it may, it occupies half of what was the historic Léoville estate (with the other part, of course, divided between Léoville Poyferré and Léoville Barton), and most especially the Clos at the heart of the former estate. Las Cases always makes a monumental, long-lived wine that can rival and in some years surpass the first growths. It may not quite scale those heights in 2024, but it is a grand wine with a long life ahead. It is released at a 31% discount on last year’s price.

Meyney is right next door to Montrose, but on rather different soils. There is some of the same Terrace 4 gravels, but there is also is also limestone, marl, sands and clay. There is also a significant plot of poorly drained soil next to the river where Petit Verdot actually flourishes, and those Petit Verdot vines, most of which are around 70 years old, form a significant part of Meyney’s aromatic signature. Under the same ownership (Credit Agricole), we also have Pauillac Fifth Growth Grand-Puy Ducasse. This wine has shown a notable increase in ambition over the last few years.

Wednesday 21 May

The sublime 2024 Figeac is released at a whopping 37% discount on last year’s price, at £564/6 – and it enjoys some of the highest scores of the vintage. Figeac was a big winner in the 2022 St-Émilion reclassification, and now plays in the very top league: Premier Grand Cru Classé (A). It should probably have always been there, but never mind. It is one of the oldest properties in Bordeaux, with roots in the second century and the Roman Figeacus family. The most venerable vines are over 100 years old. But they also have a space age new cellar which saw its first vintage in 2021, designed to make things even more precise. It is always a very distinct St-Émilion because of the high proportion of Cabernets in the blend: in 2024, that blend works out as 39% Cabernet Sauvignon, 33% Merlot, and 28% Cabernet Franc. The Cabernets come over beautifully in the intensely floral bouquet. In the mouth it is silky and fine, powerful, but also very poised. It completely shrugs off the 100% new oak, which is hardly visible. Clearly one of the wines of the vintage.

The Ausone estate is anchored to the St-Émilion hill at a spot called Roc Blancan, ‘white rock’, and limestone is in evidence everywhere. The cellars are embedded in the cliff. The seven hectares of vineyard are distributed across small, sheltered terraces with south-easterly exposition. This is a very historical place; the vineyard sometimes turns up Roman pottery, and only three different families have managed it since the fourteenth century. The Vauthier family are currently on their eleventh generation in charge, with Alain and his eldest daughter Pauline currently at the helm. Uncorked’s note on their 2024 reads, ‘Lovely balance, fresh structure, succulence, great finesse, with a lick of posh smoky new wood. And really very long!’ It is released today at £1824/6. 

With a little more Merlot than at the neighbours, Léoville Poyferré can make a plush style of St-Julien. This property has been in the hands of the Cuvelier family for over a hundred years; it enjoyed an astonishing renaissance after 1979, when Didier Cuvelier took over. Since 2017, his niece Sara Lecompte-Cuvelier has been in charge, and she has presided over a series of vintages that have put it right at the head of the St-Julien pack. The style has taken a turn from weight towards sheer energy. With plots spread across the plateau, the estate enjoys some very varied terroir, which translates into complexity in the wine. In 2024, intense selection at the winery door was followed by a lower temperature vinification and less pumpover, for less extraction, the first goal being balance. Today’s release of the 2024 at £283/6 sees the cheapest release price for Poyferré since the 2014 vintage. It is a lovely wine, with slick, dark iodine-infused fruit followed by graphite and tobacco notes. It is neither plush nor lean, but balanced, deft and supple, with polished tannins and a lifted mouthfeel.  

Few properties have been so improved over recent years as what is sometimes referred to as the ‘Scottish château’, Third Growth Cantenac Brown. The château owns some 60 hectares of vines between Margaux and Cantenac: recent years have seen both extensive replanting of the vineyards, and the purchase of new plots. Yields have been reined it, and organic principles applied. In the cellar, plots are vinified separately according to grape variety, vine age and terroir. The 2024 is released this afternoon at £171/6. The blend is a fair representation of the vineyard: 70% Cabernet Sauvignon, 27.5% Merlot, 1.5% Cabernet Franc. 1% Petit Verdot.

Tuesday 20 May

This morning sees the release of the Clarence Dillon stable. Haut-Brion and La Mission Haut-Brion both enjoy their lowest release price since the 2014 vintage. Haut-Brion offers exquisite aromas of dark fruit, oyster shell and iodine, delivered in a monumental, stony structure. La Mission Haut-Brion is a little more open, with aromas of flower and cassis against hot rock and freshly-baked dough. Chapelle de la Mission has a breath of sea air and a salt-rock finish. Clarence de Haut-Brion smells like a dense mash-up of Merlot and Cabernet Franc aromas, and is a great exponent of the power that can be achieved in Pessac. ‘We never did so much grape sorting as we did in 2024 – manual, optical, densimetric, manual again’. Only the very best grapes were getting to the vats. And in a cool vintage which favoured white wines, the whites here are utterly exquisite. La Clarté de Haut-Brion is freshly cut grass, lemon and white flower, all very much driven by Sauvignon Blanc character. La Mission Haut-Brion Blanc is intense and much more Sémillon driven, with notes of lemon and lime and salt-and-vinegar crisps. Haut-Brion Blanc is beautifully refined, precise and poised. It is also immensely long.

Troplong-Mondot is released at £432/6, a 19% reduction on last year’s price (and a far cry from £612 in 2022). ‘If we hadn’t had September rains, it could have been an amazing vintage,’ they told us here. But with the intense levels of selection here (as at every serious property) they still made a good wine. Clocking in at 13.5% alcohol, it is slimmer than in most recent vintages, smooth and balanced.

Calon-Ségur sits at one of the highest, northernmost points of St-Estèphe, with the vineyards in a single block around the chateau. Once upon a time, before the marshes were drained, you could sail to the chateau door – the Romans did, and what is now the chateau was once the site of a fortified Roman settlement. The gravelly soils here are laid over deep beds of unusually varied clay. The cooler conditions of 2024 have made a svelte, lithe Calon-Ségur, tense and focussed. The bouquet is a floral panoply, a dish of plums and a sprig of thyme. In the mouth there is lovely, measured energy leading to an impressive finish. It leaves behind a long sense of sapidity. It is being raised in 100% new oak, but wears it lightly. A classy Calon with years of life ahead. It is released at £360, a 23% discount on last year’s price.

We also have excellent and excellent value Pomerol La Pointe, released at £155/6. The 2024 is brimming with energy and Pomerol typicity.

Monday 19 May

With a concentrated fruit note carried by very noble tannins, 2024 Giscours is precise and elegant. Where some nearby properties lost almost all their Merlot, careful vineyard management meant Giscours still returned a significant proportion of plusher Merlot to set against more structured Cabernet. It is released this morning at £213/6.

Also this morning, we have several entries from the Durantou portfolio. Les Cruzelles and Le Chenade are always a great showcase for what you can do in Lalande-de-Pomerol. Les Cruzelles is a single plot carved off the La Chenade vineyard; where Les Cruzelles is mainly on clay and gravel, La Chenade is on much sandier clay. The result is that Les Cruzelles is in a juicy, weighty style with evident depth, La Chenade has more lifted, floral aromatics. Montlandrie, meanwhile, is a brilliant example of what can be achieved on the limestone soils of Castillon.

Second Growth Lascombes has been released at £249/6. The 120 hectares that Lascombes has under vine account for 12% of the entire Margaux appellation, and it’s a property that has made a huge mark on the story of the commune. And think Cabernet Sauvignon classicism and Pauillac typicity at Fifth Growth Lynch Moussas. Given the release price of the 2024, this must be the best value classed growth in Bordeaux.  

Friday 16 May

Second Growth Rauzan-Ségla is always one of the very classiest tickets in Margaux. Nicolas Audebert’s mantra is ‘let the terroir do the talking’; it is a mantra he applies through a mix of very hard work in the vineyard followed by very gentle, respectful winemaking. Spanning very diverse types of soil, Rauzan comes from a terroir that has a lot to say. 2024 Rauzan-Ségla is outstanding for its intensity in a vintage where some lesser wines can suffer through the mid-palate; Rauzan, by contrast, is clearly profound. Flower-enveloped dark fruit covers a limestone-led mineral architecture – this is a wine with a long and remarkable life ahead. It is released at £283/6, which is also a 21% discount on last year’s price, and the cheapest Rauzan on release since 2014. 

Thursday 15 May

In a region where the word ‘chateau’ usually means ‘18^th century stately home’, at Laroque they really do have a proper medieval castle, complete with remains of a moat. Laroque occupies a high point on the St-Émilion plateau, and the vineyards bestride three different flavours of limestone soil. Intensive investments over the last decade have done great things here, and David Suire has fashioned a superb 2024. Released this morning, 2024 Laroque is all about St-Émilion limestone classicism, with juicy, vibrant fruit and a serious mineral crunch underneath.  

Wednesday 14 May

There has been no more striking Bordeaux success story over the last decade than the soaring profile of Carmes Haut-Brion. Carmes is a small property on superb terroir within the Bordeaux city limits, near Haut-Brion and La Mission Haut-Brion. It sits on three different soil types: gravel, stony clay, and limestone. It also defined by the highest proportion of Cabernet Franc in vineyards anywhere on the left bank or Pessac, with some of those vines as old as 90. The blend in the 2024 is 48% Cabernet Franc, 29% Cabernet Sauvignon and 23% Merlot. Not only is 2024 Carmes Haut-Brion an intensely fine wine, it is also characterized by a graciously handled whole-bunch fermentation technique. We’re used to coming across this distintive aromatic signature in Burgundy, but it’s always a surprise to meet it in Bordeaux. While this technique may not catch on widely, because of the large extra demands on tank space, it brings freshness and gloriously expanded aromatics to the finished wine.

Domaine de Chevalier Blanc is a stunning white in a vintage in which Bordeaux whites excelled. It seems restrained and linear to begin with, but as it moves over the palate a sense of grip is succeeded by an unctuousity that turns into an explosive, charged finish; then there is the long aftertaste. If the measure of a great wine is texture, this has it all. The aromatics are precise and beautiful, touching on orange, flower, pine and ginger. Domaine de Chevalier Rouge is an archetypal Pessac, with red fruit notes matched against a peppery, earthy freshness. It is released at £192/6, a 30% discount on last year’s price.

There are always a few wines we miss in en primeur tasting, and this year Uncorked didn’t get to try Pichon Baron. A sad miss, though the critics make it sound very appealing. It is released at £489/6, a 21% discount on last year.

Tuesday 13 May

Always an opulent, flamboyant wine, in 2024, Mouton-Rothschild lives up to type. It is svelte and imposing, an iron hand in a velvet glove, a glossy wine with explosively generous aromatics – but also, serious structural underlay. Even in the more open spirit of the vintage, it will still demand a good decade before being opened. It is released at £1521/6, a 25% reduction on last year’s price and the cheapest Mouton release price in over a decade.

The 2024 vintage represents a great opportunity to look at the First Growths. Those that have been released so far have come out at substantially reduced prices. And it’s worth remembering that the chateaux that made truly great wines in 2024 are those that had the financial wherewithal to respond to adverse circumstances in the vineyard. In 2024, the Firsts are archetypal: Mouton is flashy and opulent, Lafite is monumental, Margaux is intensely silky (but with a lot of structure behind that silk curtain), Haut-Brion is all about that gravelly Pessac depth. (Latour is no longer part of the en primeur system and Uncorked didn’t taste it). La Mission Haut-Brion is riveting, and every bit the equal of Haut-Brion, even if history left it outside the classification.

Right next door to Mouton, Armailhac has a little more sand in its soils, which means if it is a little less powerful than the majestic neighbour, it is also refined and finely textured – and usually ready to drink earlier. The lovely 2024 has beautiful aromatic definition. It is layered and long, delicately structured with a nice of acidity and a thread of toast.

Monday 12 May

St-Julien stablemates Léoville and Langoa Barton have been in the hands of the same family longer than any other (the Bartons bought both in the 1820s), but they have quite distinct identities. The Léoville Barton vineyards lie in the north of St-Julien, between the chateau and the river, and the style tends to be old-school St-Julien, powerful and elegant; the Langoa Barton vineyards lie in the south of the appellation on cooler, gravel-rich soils, and the style of the wine is more restrained. What they both have in common, in the words of Jane Anson, is that ‘quality is at an all-time high’ – and both have made excellent 2024s. Léoville Barton is released at a 32% discount on last year's price.

Thursday 8 May

Today is a public holiday in France (they know how to celebrate VE Day properly) so no Bordeaux releases.

Wednesday 7 May

The monumental 2024 Montrose was Uncorked’s wine of the vintage. The bouquet has the instantly compelling quality of great wines. (My own tasting note is, ‘flowers on the seashore’.) The palate is sleek and intense, the aftertaste as engaging as it is extremely long. There is broad critical agreement that Montrose is among the very top wines of the year – this is a property that has long been considered ‘the First Growth of St-Estèphe’. It is released at £507 per case of six, a 30% drop on last year’s price.

The terroir at Montrose runs down from the plateau to the riverside. The proximity to the Gironde makes this a very well-ventilated site, and as a result of the constant, drying wind the vineyards are subject to much lower incidence of mildew and vine disease than many comparable vineyards – a boon in 2024. The vineyards straddle two of the Médoc’s premium gravel platforms, Terrace 3 and Terrace 4. These perform quite differently. On Terrace 3 the roots can dig deeper in search of water, but on the compact, iron-rich soils of Terrace 4 the roots reach a point where there can get no further and rely on capillary action to bring up water. Going forward, Montrose will be made only from the Terrace 4 heartland of the vineyard around the chateau, where Cabernet flourishes. (We tasted a separate and very distinct ‘Terrace 3’ cuvée, which will not be released en primeur). 

In the challenging 2024 vintage, there is often a wider than usual difference between first and second wines. But Dame de Montrose also overperforms in its field, and we are delighted to recommend it.

Also this morning we have Talbot, released at £194/6.

Also today, we have two lovely St-Émilions: Berliquet is released at £195/6, and La Gaffeliere is released at £213/6. And from Pessac-Léognan, the very serious, beautifully put-together Haut-Bailly is released at £345/6, a 36% discount on last year's price.

Tuesday 6 May

Cheval Blanc sits at the limit of the St-Émilion appellation, bordering Pomerol and Petrus, with a third of its vines on the same streak of Petrus blue clay. The vineyard is planted 60:40 Cabernet Franc: Merlot, and it’s very much the Cabernet Franc that dominates the finessed, quietly exquisite bouquet of the 2024. For precision engineering in a glass, few wines anywhere in the world can rival what they do here. Every aspect of viticulture, terroir and winemaking is expensively, intensively pored over. In 2024, grapes went through layer after layer of sorting, with some 34% of the harvest being rejected. The result is a finely-toned, beautiful wine. It is released at a 28% discount on last year’s price.

‘Pauillac consistency in an inconsistent vintage,’ is Jane Anson’s snappy précis of 2024 Lynch-Bages, and she’s bang on the money with this exceptional Pauillac. Lynch-Bages has always occupied a swathe of great, gravelly terroir that sweeps from the heights of the Bages plateau (at 34 metres) down almost to the banks of the Gironde. But the extraordinary work put in by the Cazes family over the last 15 years have seen the wine ascend to new levels. Micromapping the vineyards from 2009 has allowed both much more precise viticulture, as well as plot-by-plot vinification in the hugely expanded cellar. 2024 has brought a wine of power, intensity and terroir typicity. It is released at a 14% discount on last year’s price, and looks to be the cheapest of any available vintage of Lynch-Bages.  

Also this morning, from Pessac we have Smith-Haut-Lafitte.

Durfort-Vivens is unusually low-profile for a second growth, which means it is also one of the best value. It’s a far cry from the 18^th century, when wine lover and future American president Thomas Jefferson ranked Durfort-Vivens just behind Lafite, Latour and Margaux. But the terroir is excellent, and quality has been soaring back up here – especially since 2009, when Gonzague Lurton began introducing biodynamics, after spotting the increased vibrancy of biodynamically managed vineyards. On very gravelly soil, Durfort has the highest proportion of Cabernet of any property in Margaux, and that always comes across in the finished wine. Gonzague has no doubt this was also an asset in a vintage in which Médoc Merlot had a rough time. In 2017 Gonzague introduced 2 clay amphorae as an experiment. He was so impressed by the results in terms of purity and freshness that there are now 160 in the cellar. Of his 2024, he says, ‘we don’t have the shoulders of some other vintages, but we have beautiful ripeness, round fruit with no green or bitter elements’.

Also today we've had Pauillac's Haut-Bages Liberal. This comes from two sections of very pukka Pauillac terroir, one next to Latour overlooking the Gironde, the other on the Bages plateau next to Pichon Baron. Owner Claire Villars has completely transitoned the estate to biodynamic viticulture, no mean feat in the damp Bordeaux climate. The vineyards are planted to 78% Cabernet Sauvignon, but in the final blend of the 2024 that proprtion rose to 94%. It is complex and expressive. 

Pomerol estate Gazin has a full 19 hectares of vines on the plateau, more than any other winery in the appellation, all in one single block. It also commands the appellation’s highest point, next to Pétrus, at just over 40 metres. The vineyard is planted to 90% Merlot, 7% Cabernet Sauvignon and 3% Cabernet Franc, though the proportion of Cabernets is set to increase in response to climate change.   

Thursday 1 May

Today is the Labour Day public holiday in France, so there will be no Bordeaux releases. Tomorrow will probably be quiet as well, but we expect a busy week next week.

Wednesday 30 April

Angelus is released this morning, at a 31% discount on last year’s price. A former Premier Grand Cru Classe A, Angelus is not longer part of the St-Emilion classification, having withdrawn alongside Ausone and Cheval Blanc in 2021/2022.

Tuesday 29 April

The first of the First Growths to be released in the 2024 Bordeaux campaign has arrived this morning: Lafite is released at an impressive 30% drop in price on last year’s price, and the cheapest release price since the 2014 vintage. Always among the most profound wines of Bordeaux, the 2024 is as monumental and elusive as ever, stony and enigmatic en primeur, but clearly possessed of a profound depth that will take time to fully reveal itself. Tightly wound, it leaves an impressively long finish of salty cassis. It is the first vintage of Lafite to be certified as organic, despite the challenges of a vintage that saw some chateaux step back from organic viticulture to save their crop. Lafite is one of the great wines of Bordeaux from one of the very greatest terroirs.

Where Lafite is 96% Cabernet this vintage, the second wine Carruades has a much higher proportion of Merlot. It has some of the same sense of salty minerality that Lafite expresses, set against a more open aspect of plum and rose.

Also released, we have stablemate Duhart-Milon. From contiguous terroir to Lafite, with the same fine gravels and black sands over a bedrock of limestone, but on lower ground with a more northerly exposure. Once upon a time it was made as the second wine of Lafite. For even longer it remained in the shadow of Lafite. But it has evolved an identity all its own, with a team all its own since 2001, and has gone from strength to strength over the last two decades. The 2024 is muscular, powerful, with not an inch of wasted fat. It leaves a lingering impression of cassis imbued with sea air. It is released at a 20% discount on last year’s price.

Gruaud Larose has occupied almost exactly the same sprawling 82-hectare vineyard since 1855, when it was ranked it as a Second Growth. You can get a fabulous view of the vineyards either rolling away towards the forest, or else down to the river, from the huge viewing tower that the chateau has installed a little incongruously on the St-Julien plain. It is great terroir: in wet 2024, fine gravel soils let excess water drain easily while the wind from the river dried the vines, meaning the mildew here was less harsh than at some estates. They achieved a dense and impressively powerful 2024 marked by elegant tannins and a real flash of energy. It is released at a 28% discount on last year’s price.

Angludet has always made a fine ambassador for the elegant, aromatic style of wine we associate with Margaux. Owner, resident and winemaker Ben Sichel likes to joke that the decision to go entirely over to biodynamics was as much about his own health as that of the vineyard - although he may have had second thoughts given the extra work involved. And it was definitely a struggle in 2024. Nevertheless, he has achieved an excellent result in 2024, fighting the vintage to make a wine with body and length. It has been raised 60% in barrel, and 40% in amphorae, the latter accentuating the sense of purity and freshness in the wine.

Thursday 24 April 

There is a crown on each corner of the Branaire-Ducru label, alluding to the noble families of four previous owners. Things have been quietly at this St-Julien fourth growth. There is a whole new cellar with double the number of vats, allowing a much more precise approach to plot-by-plot vinification. The winery is gravity-fed. Yields have been cut back even as the vineyard has been slightly expanded.  

Unlike many Bordeaux chateau owners, François-Xavier Maroteaux is an understated fellow. But he couldn’t help but looked pleased with himself when he showed us his 2024. ‘It was a vintage when you needed to harvest at the perfect date for each plot. It’s expensive work to be so precise!’ Despite the costs, 2024 Branaire-Ducru is released this morning at a 17% discount on last year’s price. It’s a classy wine with energy, fine tannins, and a lifted finish - and it’s hard to imagine a better glass of St-Julien typicité at the price.

Wednesday 23 April 

Pontet-Canet has been a trailblazer. It was one of the very first classed growths to convert to biodynamic viticulture, no easy thing in damp Bordeaux. It led the way in innovations that have since become widespread, including plot-by-plot vinification and amphorae for raising the wine. It is released today at a 9% discount on last year's price. Writing today on robertparker.com, William Kelley has scored it as one of the joint top wines of the vintage. 

Tuesday 22 April 

There used to be a bit of a gap between our en primeur tasting week and the first releases, but no more. Last week we were tasting 2024s in Bordeaux, and this morning sees the first release of the campaign - Pauillac classic and staunch Uncorked favourite Chateau Batailley. From its extremely gravelly spot on the plateau, Batailley has achieved a long-standing reputation for offering absolute Pauillac typicity at a very fair price. 2024 saw the property celebrate 100 years in the hands of the Borie-Castéja family, and the 2024 vintage is released with a special anniversary label - not to mention the possibility to buy single boxed bottles in the chubby 225cl Marie-Jeanne format, for a bit of table theatre. The roots of this property go back much further than 100 years; the name evokes one of the last French-English battles of the Hundred Years War, which took place on the site of the modern vineyards.