Beychevelle, Yields, and Coates

[AKR]

So I've been slowly chewing my way through Coates more recent Bordeaux book, maybe a chapter a couple nights a week.

It's definitely interesting, and worthy of a spot on an enthusiasts bookshelf, especially since it can be had for a song on Amazon.

One of the big differences it seems to me between his form of wine criticism/writing is spending a lot of efforts on the attributes of the land/weather and the vineyard practices, and how he expects that to affect the end product. The actual reviews of wines can have fairly Spartan notes, with cryptic notes like "Quite Good, Best in 20XX", that don't give one a sense if the wine is lean or fat, or raspy versus smooth.

When one compares that to the American style of wine writing, which is less about how the wine was made, and more about how it tastes, its quite interesting.

Especially since in many cases the British palate and US one (generalizing broadly) can be in sync.

I was struck by that when skimming the Beychevlle entries. Coates feels that they should be making better wine, and observes that their cropping habits of 57 hl/ha is very much out of line with their cru classe neighbors. LLC is down at a stingy 31 hl/ha or so. So there is some rational reason why their wines are not as rich, as concentrated as Deleon's. (at least in the era when these books were written, I have not tasted recent examples of either)

Parker would just taste them and with his singular palate be able to just identify the difference and be able to project that (once upon at time) watery Beychevelle would not make old bones.

One thing I'd give credit to Coates for though, he is quite opposed to fine wine being made with machine harvesting, and details that in the major estates that are not so enlightened about that. Its hard in anything but the very best vintages to keep the less ripe clusters out when machine harvesting. He really harps on squishing the grapes harder isn't a substitute for good vineyard practices.

So I guess when I think about it, I'd rather pick out the names that have all best practices, figuring that there is some value in what they are doing over time. (I still can't understand why all that good work hasn't paid off at Ferrand Lartigue, a most frustrating wine as it has aged)

What are your thoughts on this?

[AlohaArtakaHoundsong]

To me it is paramount that the winemaker/proprietor/owner makes wine they like to drink themselves. There is no need for every wine to please a single person's palate.

[sdr]

What book is this?

All I see on Amazon is Clive's creaky version from 2004, with notes from vintages 1952 to 2003.

True, it's available for 78 cents, which probably qualifies as a bargain even by AKR standards.

[AKR]

That's probably the one. But its more about the estates in my mind.

I just grabbed a range of his books there, and am chewing my way through them.

I've prowled around for old hard copies of The Vine as well, without much luck on Amazon.

[tim]

The Coates book that I love is Grands Vins from 1995. It has the most detailed description of the characteristic of various vintages that I have seen, especially older vintages. (Although Jeff Leve does a good job on his website as well). The tasting notes go far back, although they are not particularly detailed and they were from over 20 years ago.

[JimHow]

Yes Tim that's the one I have. I remember in the late nineties when I was discovering and learning about the wines of the Medoc I was in awe of his summaries of the estates and his notes on the ancient vintages.

[greatbxfreak]

Old news, old book, Beychevelle and yields are another story now!

[Tom In DC]

To Arv's original point, best practices and prices are a "which came first, the chicken or the egg" situation. The net result for classified Bordeaux has been that the influx of big money over the last 30+ years has acted like a rising tide lifting all boats.

But best practices cannot overcome all obstacles. Take the extreme example of if I planted a vineyard in my front yard...

[AKR]

Yes, I seem to remember some Coates sneer in that vein regarding Bon Pasteur. I might be summarizing loosely, but his view it was basically a very good wine, given the terroir they are working with. A sort of backhanded praise, like one might hear at a dog show. "A fine specimen, considering the modest bloodlines"

(along those lines, look at the note I posted on Monteviejo, where Rolland consults in Argentina)

[AlexR]

Coates is old school. He's 75 now.
He has the background of an upper class English wine merchant of décades past.

There's good and bad about that.
I like the way he scores wines without pinning percentage points. A huge relief.

Alex R.

[Blanquito]

Barring a few extremes, I find the notion hard to believe that terroir varies that much between vineyards within a region like Bordeaux. Sure, microtopography and microclimate (usually linked) and geological substrate vary (though usually not by all that much in Bordeaux), but we know there are "great" terroir in Bordeaux that occur in virtually all of these topoedaphic combos. Some sites are favored in some vintages while others are in other vintages. To sneer at a terroir within Bordeaux just seems silly (barring the obvious examples of a wetland or ledge on a ridge). So many other variables seem to matter much more. But who knows, maybe Bon Pasteur is fatally flawed in some way....

I can buy the idea that some patch or parcel always seems to give the best grapes year after year, but is that the subsoil or the age and genetics of the vines? Really, how much does the soil and rocks vary within Bordeaux? Some gravel, some clay, some sand, they all seem to make great wines. What is the range of these geologies across Bordeaux or all of the great terroirs of the world?

Clive, I sneer at your sneer.

[AlexR]

Patrick,

The Burgundians have a very different notion of teroir.
It gets downright microscopic there.

I believe that terroir matters just a much in Bordeaux, just usually on a larger scale.

When I think of Haut Brion and La Mission, just across the road from one another, I believe that the enormous difference in character can only come from the terroir (they have had the same owner since 1983).
You have 5th growths abutting 1sts in Pauillac.

The différences are due mainly to the soil.
Of course, château, up to an including the very best, operate outside the appellation system.
This is why, when Montrose buys a chunk of Phelan-Ségur or Pétrus acquires one of Gazin, this is totally within the bounds of the law - even though it scandalises someone from Burgundy, where you would go to jail for doing such a thing.

All the best,
Alex