You're listening to another episode of Barrel to Bottle, The Binny's Podcast. I'm Alicia Barrett. I do wine education at Binny's. And in the room today, we have... I'm Bill Newton. I'm one of the buyers, Nat, the Bordeaux buyer, however. Ben Madeska. I'm a wine manager. Barbara Hermann. I'm the Bordeaux buyer and buyer for other things. And I'm Greg. And in this episode, I'm playing the big old dummy who doesn't know anything. And that's going to be really easy for me. Like all wine episodes. Thanks, Greg. So we're here today because the four of us actually just got back from En Premier in Bordeaux. And Barb, why don't you just explain a little bit for us? What is En Premier? Why did we go over there? And what's going to happen here over the next couple of months? En Premier is a yearly event. The Bordelais sell their wine differently than any other wine region in the world. So for the wines that were made at the end of last year, the wines that were from vineyards that were there harvested say like last September, the Bordelais now present barrel samples of these wines to people in the wine trade and to wine critics. This goes on for about two week process. Then they start to put them on the market for sale. And they do this in a whole different way too. In Bordeaux, you have the Chateau, which is the winery. You have a middleman who's called a courtier and is a broker. And then you have the kind of like the distributor, which is a negotiant. So starting actually yesterday, a couple Chateaus talked to the negotients that they do business with and basically offered them their wine for sale at a determined price. And the negotients that buy this wine put it out on for sale to their accounts like all over the world. And this process will now go on for about the next, could be a month to two months, depending on history, yeah. So this is our Futures program and we are one of the few big retailers in the country that have a pretty robust program. And so you as a consumer can reserve your allocation, reserve your wine before it even comes in at what should be, but not guaranteed, but what should be a lower price than it will be once it actually hits the market and kind of the traditional Yeah, that's correct. And really the main, there's a whole bunch of reasons for buying Futures. Some people just like to do it. There are a couple that are very, very good. One is that, you know, a lot of these wines aren't made, you know, they're not made in factories. They're not made in millions of cases. Some of these wines are made, you know, maybe they'll be 500 cases made or maybe a thousand or some quite a bit larger, but these wines get sold all over the world. So if you want to buy, you know, often like First Gros or especially some of the very small production wines, this is definitely the best time that you can get these wines because you will get them at probably the best price and you will have guaranteed great province because they're at the Chateau and then they go to the Negotiate and then they get shipped to the US and then you own them. And the other option too is, like I said, these are new wines. They're in, they're in barrel or tank. They're not going to be bottled until next fall, next winter. So you can also get them bottled how you want. You can get them as half bottles and get them as sizes. And that's always an option. Are you going to share your joke about pay now, wait two or three years? I mean, that's what it is. How much of it is a roll of the dice? How much of it is a gamble? If you are buying as an investment, that's always, could be a gamble. I mean, if you think that you're going to get a lot more money in two or three years, for sure that's maybe kind of crazy. But if you're thinking about buying excellent wine, no, that's probably not a gamble at all. Right. I think Alicia is talking about, we were going to do a marketing campaign toward millennials and younger, the next generation of coming wine drinker, by futures, they can't even buy a car. Barrel of Monkeys today, huh, guys? It's a lot to throw in by. I thought you were going to tell your line of, wait, so we're asking people to shell out the money now, and then they wait three years to pick up their wine? Is it three years? No, it would be like two years, but then you can put the wine away for 10, 15 years before you start drinking it, so it's great. Admittedly, this is a whole aspect of the wine world that I don't completely understand. So I'm gonna throw out a question to the group here. So let's say there's someone out there that is, they want to get Chateau Lafitte this year. So what is the best way that they can keep up with what's coming out and the things that Binny's are actually bringing in to Offer's Futures for their customers? The best way would be to know your wine manager, because they will get the first announcement from our office here of what's gonna go out on the market. And this, like I said, this could be a month, could be a month and a half from now, when Lafitte opens. But I'll get the offers in the day. Let me say, I won't get the offers, I'll get my allocations during the day. That's not something I can go out and say, oh, you know, I'd like, you know, 20 cases when some guy's only gonna give me like 12 bottles. You know, that's how it happens. But I'll get my allocations, we'll put out the price, and we'll send an announcement out to the wine managers, right, that that's going on sale. So that would be the best way, if you're looking for something that is, you know, really limited or gonna be, you know, really hot or whatever in this vintage. If you have purchased Bordeaux Futures from us in the past, you know, we will stay in touch with you by email and be letting you know as new things come in. Everything, of course, will be, will be shown on our site for as long as that can happen when allocations are so small. But yeah, I think having that relationship in your store, you know, go into your local and talk to your wine manager. And the wines are added to the website as they- As they become available. Yeah, it's live now. You can go to binnys.com and find Bordeaux Futures. There'll be a graphic on the homepage and you can find in the wine menu, if you mouse over the wine and find Bordeaux Futures, then you can find everything that we have available that isn't secret handshake apparently. Do you think the En Premier system is going to last forever? I mean- Yes. Yeah. Yeah. Because that's just how they get their money so they can't let it go. There's no reason for them not to. I mean, they get distribution all over the world. True. That's the thing. A guaranteed distribution. They don't have to worry about sell through. Yeah. They don't have to have a sales force. Although I will say this, in the past couple of years, I've seen more representatives from Bordeaux than I've seen from higher end wineries in Napa. Interesting. Yes. They know that they have to go out and talk about their wine and taste out things, and whether it's to us, but to restaurateurs and that, and so there's a lot of people going out there around the world. Bordeaux is two worlds at once, because it's some of the most expensive and finest wines in the world come from there, but also they have many thousands of Chateau producers, and a lot of them aren't En Premier, a lot of them are just through Almost very few are out of the thousands, there's a couple of hundred that are in En Premier. That's the rarefied, highly desirable stuff. Are you seeing reps from that class? Correct. Oh, wow. Oh, yeah, yeah. Well, even just the number of US market managers that we met when we were over there, their job is to build the kind of, not credibility per se, but just raise awareness and share their wines across the country. And to throw around the expense account. Yeah, someone's gotta do it. What I heard was there's this worldwide scramble to buy wines, but before that is a two week long party, and you guys went to the party. Party is one way of putting it. Yeah, but tasting of- Marathon, maybe? It depends. This wasn't so bad. I think we tasted about 200 wines of the 2022 vintage. Yeah, we definitely worked our way around, and we started at some larger events, and, yeah, tasted dozens of wines in a sitting, and then went to various chateaus all throughout the region, you know, everywhere from Saint Estephe down to Pessac, and Did you ride bikes this time? No, we didn't ride bikes. What the hell, Barb? We didn't get there early enough. That was the thing. This was a little more concise trip, so we didn't have a lot of free time to play around. We're all business, Greg. I have traveled with Barb a couple of times, and my experience has been trying to keep up. Yep. Nothing's changed, Greg. Very true. For those that are curious and do keep up on Bordeaux wines and futures, I do want to talk about the 2022 vintage itself, and rather than articulate some really beautiful, well-constructed summary of the vintage, you can read all those with the critics. I chose to just highlight a few key words here that I think are important to remember this year. So firstly, we're talking about heat waves in 2022. For many, this was the hottest year on record. We saw temperatures up to 105 degrees Fahrenheit, and this was in June, July, August. So again, our kind of prime time of ripening for the vines. This matters as that heat kind of cranks up, and that will affect the acid retention, that will affect the ripening, the flavor profile in these berries. Alongside that heat, we also had a lot of drought and extremely low rainfall. We're looking at kind of levels similar to kind of 2010 and 2016, but we didn't get kind of that water, and that made kind of where your vineyard is and the soil type that you have, if you were able to retain any water from the winter, very important. The other key point of the vintage would be the berry size. Given those first two conditions, we had very, very small berries on the vine, resulting in very low yields. And so this high ratio of kind of skin to juice has translated in the wine to very kind of concentrated, very dense, very tannic wines. And so this matters a great deal because again, the nuance of the site, the wine making skill that a Chateau would practice matters a lot because we tasted a lot of very fine, smooth, velvety tannins and then we tasted a lot of kind of rugged, austere tannins. So we'll get into that in a little bit. And just to put this in kind of context for numbers, we were at Chateau Margot and they told us their berry size was down 35%. Chateau Palmer 25%. So significantly smaller berries. The other key piece that we heard was the high diurnal range. The difference between these low evening temperatures and again, those very, very warm daytime temperatures is one thing that sets 2022 apart from say 2003. Because of that spread, the berries were able to retain acidity and we were able to have some freshness in these wines. Then lastly, the harvest was early and very long. They had wonderful conditions to harvest the fruit. We're looking for the reds. They were starting in that first week of September, September 7th, September 8th or so, and it lasted about 20 to 30 days. We kept hearing around the region of this very long harvest, because picking these individual berries at different ripeness levels was key. I remember at Ponte Cana, their average pick time was about 12, and this year was 20. So this long but early harvest under perfect conditions. And just to close, not everyone produced amazing wine, but for those that did, they often cited just the resilience of the vine, the adaptation that occurred with this kind of the drought, despite the drought and heat. So it's kind of a mysterious vintage. It's not kind of what in a textbook you should be expecting because there were some gorgeous, gorgeous wines despite the kind of difficult conditions. What were your takeaways, guys? You mentioned 2003, and that came up a lot on this visit. And it was kind of the last real heatwave year, the infamously heatwave year. And a number of winemakers commented that the wines are very, very different from 2003. So if you're looking at another reference point, I think the temptation is to look at 2003, but it's really the final wines are quite a bit different. And a lot of winemakers talked about how much they learned in the last 20 years and how they handled vineyard conditions much differently, how they handled winemaking much differently. And the result is really very different wines from 20 years ago. Yeah, we were at several estates that said that this was the earliest they'd ever started their harvest, which I think is just a natural outflow from the fact that 20 years ago, 25 years ago, a lot of these estates were trying to make wines that were super ripe and big. And that was the style back then. Well, they've gotten away from that. So it was kind of normal for them to want to pick earlier anyway. And as it happened, that worked out really well for them in this vintage. We want to give you, the consumers, some insights as to kind of what stood out to us, whether it be the Appalachian or specific chateaus in our time. So I want to start on the left bank. And after a fairly large tasting, we went over to Margot. So let's start there. And a property that really stood out to me was our time at Rose-Ansegla. This is a chateau that is owned by Chanel. They too had very low yields, about 30 hectoliters per hectare. And we'll see that around the region, except for the right bank. They kind of managed to have some normal yields. But this Rose-Ansegla this year for me was a very kind of dense, powerful, kind of rich wine, a lot of fruit intensity, great length, and broader and richer, I would say, than some other Margot wines. And maybe if someone was stuck too, we first went to bring Cantonec. And I think those styles contrasted quite significantly. Yeah. And I will say for me, I think the wine that almost most impressed me in Margot was Brain Cantonec, because as we've been talking, I mean, this is a vintage that produced a lot of very, very concentrated wines, and some of them terrific, but a lot of very concentrated wines. And Brain Cantonec was incredibly refined. The tannins were impeccable in this wine. And it was just, you know, seamless and beautiful quality of fruit. And again, very, very, very fine tannins. I think that, you know, to me, that managing the tannins was something I was starting, I tried to like really focus in on a lot of the wines we taste, on most of the wines we tasted, because they did run on the whole gamut. But this wine I think was exceptional, because it was very Margo-y in its style. And it wasn't quite as different, I think, as some of the other wines were. What do you mean by Margo-y? Margo-y. Margo-y. Margo-esque, as Roger would say. It was very aromatic. It had this pure red fruit quality to it, with this little bit of like mint, almost a little bit of an herbal, but not herbaceous quality to it. And I think with a lot of the other wines, which some of them were utterly, were incredibly delicious, the fruit was just a little bit of a, it was, they were just riper and plusher smelling than brain. Comparing these two Chateau for me is such a perfect illustration of the vintage, where you have, you know, Brain Cantinac and Rosanne Segla, both producing excellent top tier wine with very different styles. And I think that's something we saw again and again and again, where the character of the Chateau really came through and there wasn't really just one kind of consistent style throughout the vintage, but a lot of Chateau made very excellent wine in It is certainly a vintage that is very difficult to generalize. And anyone try to explain it simply, I think, is doing a disservice to the nuance that is Bordeaux. Is that every year or is that specific to the 23 or 22? The stylistic variety from Chateau to Chateau, is this vintage particularly canvas? Previous years, you see, I feel like I've seen more consistency. I was really struck by how different they were, but still maintaining quality. Yeah, there's still going to be a winemaking philosophy that each individual Chateau will bring and thus separate their wine from their peers in some way. But I think my point was more on sometimes it's easy when we're speaking with customers or even for customers to understand each vintage, you just want to remember a couple of words and oh, this is a lean, high acid, kind of earlier drinking vintage, How many different Margot wines did you taste while you were in Margot? Whole bunch? Whole bunch. Whole bunch, okay. We tasted a lot of Margot wines. In a morning tasting. Yeah, but Barb took us around and we went to, again, Brink Kanchinac, Ras en Seigler, Palmer, and then Chateau Margot. So these are the highlights of the highlights. Let's go next. I don't know. Let's go to Pauillac. Pauillac is a fun trip because that's where you have Chateau. You have Latour, you have Lafitte, and you have Moutain Rothschild. So three first growths, all in Pauillac. So let's talk for a minute just about, this was a year when I think most people agree that not every wine that was made was great, but for the most part, the top wines did really, really well. I would say especially Lafitte and La Tour were just both amazing wines. And it was a lot of fun to be able to try them. And the other nice thing about those two Chateaus was, they have second wines and they have other wines. So we were able to try several wines at La Tour and Lafitte. And they were really consistent across the board. One of the most memorable visits for me was at Lafitte. And you know, it's easy to say, oh, you know, you loved this extremely expensive first-growth wine, but it's more than that. It was, you know, we tasted through four wines. And Duart Mion and their Carroir de Lafitte, I thought, were awesome. And they were still so polished. There was such precision in the wine that just the consistency in the wines that were presented, I thought, was pretty remarkable. And one of my takeaways is Carroir de Lafitte. It's still not cheap, but something I loved. Any indication of stuff this vintage is getting declassified into the second and third labels? Well, all the top chateaus make selections. Now, some chateaus, because the yields were very firm, some of them were incredibly low, like some were in the 22 hectare, hectal liters per hectare. Some of them did not make a second wine, and maybe what they culled off or whatever is not even going into like a third or something like that. Sure. So it really, it varies. I mean, and it depends. Like some of the second wines are selections from the whole entire parcels that they have. Others are vineyard sites that are designated or just don't make it, don't make the cut to go into the Grands Vins. So the second wine is really, it comes from different plots. It's really maybe not a true second wine. It's really hard to say, but. I'm all about it. If they make more wine that's accessible to people, 100%, great. If it's a quote unquote second wine, but comes from a completely different site that is just designated for that wine, and we're going to taste Le C by Carme Haut Brion here, that's a separate site, right? That's not a selection from their estate there. So that's different. That could be okay. It could or could be lousy, you know, the other thing to be, because, no, because, you know, I'm saying for a different reason. Because if the stuff was, if that location was really top-notch, that juice would be going into the Grand Ven, you know? So, and why isn't it top-notch? It's because of the environment, you know, where the soil, all the stuff underneath it, it maybe has more problems ripening, it doesn't have, the drainage isn't as good, doesn't hold water as well, blah, blah, blah, you know, those kinds of things. So that's why it's, you know, not Grand Ven parcel. These folks have been making wine for over 400 years in this area. They probably have a pretty good idea of where the best stuff comes from, right? Oh, for sure. It's like Burgundy, they've been doing it for a thousand years. What stood out to you in Poyak, Ben? Well, definitely one of my favorite regions. I thought it was a real successful year for them. With a vintage like this that tended towards power with more tan and more flavor, regions that traditionally have made more powerful wines like Poyak are real successful. They kind of know how to manage that, they're able to lean into that and still make really powerful but harmonious wines. I was a big fan on the first day we tasted Pichon Barone and Pichon La Londe, and the last few vintages, those really have been two of my top wines. A lot of times I kind of go back and forth between one or the other being my wine of the vintage. This year, I think I would give it to Pichon La Londe. It was just very complete, very harmonious. Everything was in place. It was powerful but not harsh at all. It was just layers of flavor. It was very well done. Yeah, I still remember that wine from day one. It was exceptional. I just want to do a shout out to Ponte Cannae as well. And this is one that you've brought in. Why are you chuckling? Did you not like it? I don't know. Oh. There's still subjectivity, guys. All right. Anyway, I was very impressed with kind of the depth, the muscle of this wine that was so kind of cassis and plum and coffee, and I think will age beautifully. You know, they too articulated how early it was. And if you're unfamiliar with Ponte Cannae, they are a biodynamic producer. And so they are restricted to kind of how they can handle some of these climatic challenges. And, you know, they did some really cool stuff. They were spraying this kind of clay mixture on their vines to act as kind of sunscreen and protect the grapes from sunburn. And so they got very, it was the first time they've ever done this. So interesting to hear the kind of innovation that's happening in vineyard management to deal with these conditions. So I really did like Ponte Cane. Yeah. And I agree with Ben in that it was a really just very consistent vintage for Payak, I thought. I thought that, you know, just about everything I tasted from Payak was very good, at least very good. And, you know, I think kind of moving into our next commune, I'm not sure I can say the same in Saint-Julien, and I tend to really like wines of Saint-Julien, but I did find some inconsistencies here when we tasted through the wines that first day. Yeah, looking at my notes from that first tasting, a couple words just repeated again and again and again, firm, structured, robust, which is I think what Saint-Julien does very well. So when Chateau were able to, again, kind of like lean into that and make it with that style, it could be very successful, but that could be tough to manage. What were some of your highlights from Saint-Julien? L'Eleveur Bartholome. Yeah. I know it's going to come on the market very early. Be on the lookout. But L'Eleveur Bartholome is a little bit different than maybe its neighbors in that the wine is produced with just like you see this gobs of fruit. It's very, very aromatic, very plush, very velvety. Obviously, structure always for aging. I mean, you know, there's probably people still drinking 80s or 82s, you know. It's not quite as four-square in that style, that real structured style and kind of brawny style that a lot of the other Saint Julien's are at. So there's this great, great emphasis on velvetyness and freshness to the wine. Excellent. L'Eleveur Bartholome. Some other highlights at a pretty affordable price point that I thought were solid, La Grange and Gloria typically bring those in. I liked the Brunère a lot. Brunère du Creux, yeah. You know, another one, St. Pierre, we tasted, I thought it showed pretty well. And then we had a 2009 St. Pierre one night at dinner because we hadn't had enough Bordeaux yet in the day. I don't know why we did that. What are you going to go drink? I promise we have... Burgundy and Bordeaux? Oh, we definitely did. That's what we did. Lots of Burgundy, lots of champagne at night. Okay, so I'm kind of parched. I wanted to try tasting some things here. Yeah, me too. I just wasn't gonna say it. I grabbed some wines that I think are meaningful to our trip, and again, a little bit more affordable. So I wanna start, two of these are from Pessac. And Ben, we were talking about Pessac earlier, and I think this trip brought a lot of clarity to the region. What were your takeaways on Pessac? Cause we spent one of the final days down there, and we went to actually all three, well, we went to these two properties we're about to have. This was a trip that I feel like Pessac kind of snapped into focus for me a little bit, better than it had. I've just never really got my head around it for some reason, being able to taste some of these wines side by side. And I thought it was very successful for the region. Some of my favorite wines actually are from this region this year. But there's, yeah, just a richness, kind of a depth of flavor, a little bit of a kind of rustic quality to them. They maybe didn't quite have the polish of some of the other regions, but they were really still supple, balanced, harmonious, but very character driven wines. One of our stops when we were down in Pessac was to Le Carme Haut Brion. And this was such a wonderful chateau to go and visit. I mean, one, the production is just so, so small, but they have this gorgeous picturesque chateau that is out of a fairy tale, right? And you can just imagine your life living in this beautiful chateau. And then you pan over, you pan to the right, and there's this miniature pond or manmade pond, right? I'm not sure. I think it's manmade. And they've basically built what looks like a cross between a spaceship and a boat. And this is their new winery. It was built by Philip Stark. Okay. That's Iron Man? I don't know. I just pretend like I know what she's talking about. He's a very famous architect. Okay. So, some kind of unworldly combination of history and the future. Ben and I loved the wine at Le Carme. And, you know, just for background, it is quite different in that it's 2022. It's 40% Cabernet Franc. So that kind of minty herbal quality that Barb was talking about is really on display in the wine. And it comes from just 7.8 hectares are right there. Now, we are tasting the, again, not a true second wine, but a much more affordable offering from them. It's on the shelf for 30 bucks. This is Le C or Le C in French, Des Carmes Haut Brion. And so this comes from a property further south. But I think a really accessible wine, it's brambly, it's earthy. There's a little bit of rusticity to it. You still get that herbal quality. I loved the wine. And then Bill told me to taste Le Carme when the very attractive, eloquent winemaker wasn't in front of me. Yeah, yeah. It always tastes better on the beach. 2019, by the way. Yes. 2019C Le Carme Haut Brion. It's not a sin to enjoy things. It's fine, Bill. It is. I love Carme Haut Brion. I've been talking about it since I visited there a long time ago. Yeah, no, it's great. It's a beautiful little winery. They just don't make a lot of wine. It's just not that big. This is tight wine, really bound up. Yeah, everybody laugh at the chuckle nuts over here. Listen. I ask this every time we talk about En Premier, specifically, you're in France, you're tasting wine that's been in Barrel less than six months, and you're trying to anticipate what it's going to taste like in another 18 months of Barrel. How different is it when you're tasting it out of a Barrel, and how much can you imagine it changing over that time? We're talking about wines that often need or can benefit from aging in the bottle additionally, so you're doing the most primal version of these things that you could possibly get. That's where experience helps. I mean, in terms, experience definitely helps. I think in terms of tasting, the style of like, Lafitte isn't going to change overnight, the style of Montrose isn't going to change overnight, or Margaux or any of that. I mean, they're made a little bit differently than they were 10, 20, 34, whatever, years ago, but- Oh, they still have reputations to hold up. Well, they have reputations, but they have a style, because of mainly where they're from. Barb, do you know how many times you've been? Over 20. Okay. You're probably one of the people that's not from France, like one of the few people that's not from France in the world who has the best honing of your palate on this stuff. What do you call it when you get your instrument and you try to set it so that it's- Calibrated. Calibrated, thank you, Ben. Exactly. Director of communications, ladies and gentlemen. Yeah, we always play 20 questions when I can't think of a word. So, like, you probably have one of the finest calibrated palates for this kind of tasting. And that's pretty amazing. Oh, I'm not sure about that. She's too humble. You know, she was inducted to the Commandery du Bon Temps when we were over there. Barb, I asked you to send me pictures and you did not send me pictures. I couldn't, I was wearing a robe up there. Selfie. That would have been very rude to take a selfie. Yeah, right, holding up the phone. Yeah, where did they find a robe your size? They didn't. Unfortunately. Sorry, I saw the picture. You're on your tiptoes. I saw it. She was next to basketball player, Tony Parker, so, you know. And on him, it looked like a dinner jacket, right? Yeah, okay, so that was my little bit on Carme. I loved the visit and it's gotten some good press so far. One of the other stops we made, yeah, in Pessac was to Au Bailly. And talk about a difference here in terms of the estate. They also have built a new winery there and very, very modern. All gravity-fed, these gorgeous, huge concrete vats to ferment in of all different sizes. But the difference here is that they built it all underground and the roof of the new winery is full of vegetation and trees and bushes and grasses and it almost just kind of blends in with the property. It's really quite exceptional. But we had lunch there, I bought some amazing plates and we tasted their wines and this is the Au Bailly. This is a true second wine. So I did bring Au Bailly 2020. 2020 Au Bailly 2? Is this the sequel? Yes. Sort of, yes. So a great property here. Barb, what are your thoughts? One on Au Bailly just in general over the years. Carme Haut Brion has changed a little bit. It's with the recent ownership change from about 10 years ago, maybe a little bit longer than that. But the wine isn't like too terrible. I mean, night and day different than it used to be. It's still very slim and very elegant. And it's interesting because Au Bailly is quite a ways away. It's probably a 20-minute drive maybe, 30-minute ride. It's a drive towards the southern end of the Pessac Appalachian. Closer to Chevalier, right? Yeah, Closer to Chevalier, right. So whereas, you know, Carme is like way, way up at the north. And yet I don't think they're, I think the wines have a lot of similarities. I think they're both made in this under, kind of understated, very elegant style of wine. And they, Au Bailly for sure, both of them, I think really, really do benefit with time in the bottle to develop that. I mean, like I said, what to me is fabulous about Pessac is the aroma. But it's not right there when you just open it up like in a two-year-old bottled wine. This 2020 is pretty primal. They brought the fruit though. You know, there's more like plum here than on the other one. And maybe all that big heavy fruit, like is that gonna soften over time and expose some of the herbal tastes and smells that you're talking about? Like that tobacco smoke and stuff. Well, it eventually the kind of like dissipates, you know? It kind of drops, I mean, with another 15 years or whatever, it'll really drop out of that wine, you know? And you get like almost like this patina, you know, that you're smelling and you're not smelling grape-iness really anymore. Yeah. And you're right to point out just the fruit intensity here and kind of the bouquet of fruits that you do get. It is a Merlot based wine. You just said I'm right and I have it on tape. To point out the fruitiness of the wine? It happened, folks. That's all. It happened. So a really great expression. This is $44.99 on the shelf. So again, kind of a fun way to experience some of these great Chateaus. Talking about how well it ages, we were able to taste the 78 at Au Bayi and that patina came through. Like you said, it was almost more like a cherry liqueur rather than like this ripe kind of plummy fruitiness to it and the leather and the smoke coming through. Yeah. Just a casual lunch with a Jeroboam of 78 Au Bayi. What did you guys do for fun when you were there? Did you go to the library? Bill did. I was looking for one. Bill's just like, where can I go to beauty alone? We drank in the hotel bar a bit. Should we zip up to Saint Estephe? Yeah, let's do it. Cool. Okay, number one wine in May was Montrose. And it's interesting because I always have a great, great, great respect for Montrose, but it's not always the kind of wine I really wanted to drink. It's so strong. And in this vintage, it had such incredible, brilliant fruit in that wine. Great extraction. And again, I am repeating myself, but the quality of the tannins in that wine was just exceptional. It was probably one of the most, to me it was probably one of the best built wines I tasted. For those who can't see, Barb is glowing right now. It doesn't happen very often. So insider tip, that one. I just pulled up my notes from Montrose up in Saint Estephe, and one, by the way, we're going to be tasting their second wine and we'll talk about it in a minute. I love Montrose too. I thought it was an amazing wine. It was one of my favorite wines of the trip. And then I really liked a wine called Ceylon Sagoor. I thought that was a really nice wine also, that is at Saint Estephe. Very different style, but it's not as powerful as Montrose is. It almost never is. It was a really nice wine. Inner Glass is La Dame de Montrose and a second wine of theirs. 2019. And this is where they do have designated sites that will go to this wine, but there is about 20% every year that's in flux that they'll assess and determine which wine it goes into, the Grand Venner, the second. So again, this is I think a lovely entrance into Montrose. This is $44.99 on the shelf. Again, this is from the 2019 vintage. But I think shows some of that purity of fruit that Barbara was mentioning that 2022 had. And I think you see that here in this wine too. This wine is rad. Yeah. I've bought multiple vintages of this wine. This I think is often very good value, very good quality, kind of over delivers for what it is. It shows really just true character for the region, for the producer. I will say, there were some inconsistencies up in St. Estephe that can be a difficult appellation. We're further north and they do tend to have, they're a little bit known for that more rustic, rugged style. And we did see, we did taste some wines. The tannins were kind of out of control. They were out of balance and yeah, somewhat austere. So again, kind of all over the map, but this, it just shows you go a mile down the road and the site and winemaking can give you a totally different result. Can we continue to talk about how this 2019 slaps? It has this like baking spice quality along with the fruit. It's super red. It's really good. It's fun and elegant at the same time, which is a balancing act. And in 10 years, it'll be better. Even better? Oh, maybe much, yeah. Cause I mean, the fruit is still pretty young. And it's yeah, it's a bit tannic and it's a bit, you know, tight and whatever, you know, but, you know, these like in 1920, I think the second wines from these top producers are actually very, very good. I wouldn't say, I don't want to call them investments, but they are very, very good wines to buy. They will really have that character of the first wine and they'll age. I mean, you know, maybe not for 50 years, but for 10, 15. Who wants to wait 50 years? Not me. Moving on, another day, we went over to the Wright Bank and spent some time in Pomerol and Saint Emilion and so I wanted to head over there. And Bill mentioned earlier some of the older wines that we were fortunate enough to taste. And one of the nights we went to Chateau Canaan and we were so generously given 1955 Chateau Canaan and that was truly an exceptional experience and to be able to have that, you know, a dinner with at the Chateau. And prior to that, you know, of course, tasted their 2022 wines and tasted Canaan, which was one of my wines of the vintage. It was exceptional. And then we also tasted Berliquet, which is from a site kind of adjacent to Canaan. And actually the top part of it is the same limestone plateau that Canaan comes from. And then you get some variation, some clay, and then in just kind of some more sand. So it's a very different expression. But I did bring the 2018 Chateau Berliquet. I forgot, you know, when this was purchased, but some, it was somewhat recently, meaning it wasn't like a couple decades ago. It was, it was within probably the last 10 years that Chanel added this and have really done a great job kind of preserving the unique attributes of this vineyard site. So again, you know, I would look for Canaan if that is kind of in your wheelhouse. But if not, I think, you know, Berliquet, this one was on the shelf for $59.99. I think can be another kind of more affordable option. Canaan is 75% Merlot, 25% Cabernet Franc. And the one thing I wanted to share here, just to point out contrasting styles of vineyard management, many places talked about how older vines helped them, this vintage, this established root, deep root structure, vines that have been around for decades and decades that have adapted to these challenges. But shockingly, when we were at Canaan speaking with the wine maker, his philosophy was, nope, I'm going to replant every 40 years. And he wants a more homogenous vineyard to make sure that kind of ripening is consistent and yields are consistent. And it was interesting to hear that very different philosophy. So that plays out too at Rosanne Seigler because that same ownership, and he's looking after the wines there. So, you know, looking at, again, not young vines, but younger, and they had great yields over there. They were up in the mid-40s, I think, at Canaan. And so it just shows you some different approaches that are being taken. This is not going to surprise you. I love a dissenting opinion. When somebody else has something else to say, then the standard conventional wisdom, you know, it's cool. Well, I think Bordeaux is kind of going through an interesting phase like that where from the outside, it can have this impression of very kind of monolithic and tradition and things don't really change. But when you're on the ground there, you see how dynamic it is. And people are kind of upending tradition and rethinking the ways that things have been done. The mental image I'm getting from you guys is like a person pulling a mule through a vineyard, but they're also like distracted on Instagram, on their phone at the same time. They're not pulling a mule, they're being guided by probably a very expensive draft horse. That's kind of what they all like to do. Wrong equine, sorry. What stood out to everyone else on the right bank? Greg, you're going to love this. When we're tasting Saint Emilion, it was inconsistent and I was curious to see how that played into the region. So I actually mapped the Chateau that I thought were doing a good job. You made a chart. A soil map to see what soil types were successful in Saint Emilion, and more just if that was the case. It did hold and it held up with some of the conversations we had too, where some of the limestone and clay were necessary to the success of some of these vineyards. That's outstanding. Did you do this homework on your own? Yeah. In the car between rides. You know, the best is that Bill and Ben had finished up the morning tasting. They moved a little bit more quickly than Barb and I. And I see Ben frantically overlaying maps over there at the table. So, in the time that it took Barb and I to finish, he had formed his conclusion about the most beneficial soil types in the Saint Emilion. The meme with Charlie Day with the wall with all the yarns connecting all the pictures, I'm imagining that's his hotel room. Yeah. I'll still have to go like two, three, four in the morning. Yeah. Because the map scribbled out on the hardwood floor of the hotel room. Piles of gravel. I'm glad you guys had fun. Pomerol, I think, is a really interesting place because it seems like it's very different really from any of the other areas in Bordeaux, at least the main ones, where a lot of the biggest chateaus are. You really get the feel for the winemaking, a lot of it's just farming. You really feel that when you're in Pomerol. It's just they're smaller, they're very small estates and we visited a couple on the last day, I think, and they were really good. Pomerol, another one though, a little inconsistent. Remember the first day, we actually thought we made a conclusion that Pomerol didn't perform maybe as well as some others, and then we were proven wrong and tasted some top estates and varying in size, totally, definitely some small ones in there, Yeah, the top of the top, and we were very lucky to taste some of those great wines like Conciente and Vucertan and that. But I was going to go back to Saint Emilion because there's two properties that I really haven't visited hardly at all in the past many, many years. And we went to both Pavi and Angelus. And so I'm going to be, I love both of them. Barb's going to be controversial. Yes. So Pavi, the first time I went to Pavi was probably like, I don't know, 20 years ago. And now they're in an incredible man. The tasting is in this incredible mansion with all this incredible artwork and statues around and that. But I remember Pavi in the early days, you know, and this is just like, you know, his style is, you know, very, very consistent. He made those, that wine was just so hedonistic, so lush, so big, so ripe, but so velvety. You know, you could just like dive right into it. I just thought it was, I thought that wine was just terrific. And then we went to Angelus and now it's a much more quieter tasting than it used to be. Sometimes there's been a lot of other Chateaus there that Hubert DuBois consults for or works with. And this time it was just very quiet. It was just the Angelus, you know, and there are a couple of other wines. And their style is becoming a little bit more elegant. So, you know, there's been a passing over in the wine making. And the Angelus is always was also very concentrated wine, but very roasted and with a lot of toffee, a lot of coffee, like toasty flavors to it. And it's just a little more subtle now and a little bit dialed back, but it was incredibly well made. Yeah. And this is Cab Franc country here. And, you know, 40% of the wine is Cab Franc. And maybe some of that shift came in 2018, they shifted and started aging their Cabernet Franc in Foudre. And so maybe helping that elegance, that herbal lift that was so present in the wine. At Pavi, Barb's just, you know, oh. That was more than glowing that time. And Bill and I are looking at each other like, oh my gosh, my mouth is so tired. This is such a big wine. But yeah, different styles, but yeah, very well made, no doubt. You piqued my interest. I'll have what she's having. So one other thing I want to talk about real quick is that we would be in these various barrel rooms where the producers had their 2022s resting in Beryl. And we were struck by the fact that, geez, it doesn't seem like there's very much wine in here. So it's not a vintage with tons of wine. One reason we're not throwing around prices of some of the stuff we're talking about is we just don't know what the price is going to be. The Chateaus don't set a price until they release their wine. So we will see. We will see over the next couple months. But we are expecting price increases, right, Barb? Well, it's ironic because the wine that came out today, Larvae Au Brioil, was down from 2021. But most likely, most of the wines we're talking about right now, I think, I would not be surprised that they all go up in price. Did we talk about this one? Oh, no. Yeah. We haven't talked about it, but I finished tasting it. Berliquet. Berliquet. Berliquet. It's pronounced like it's spelt. Ouch. Okay. That's pretty good. Is this 40% Cabernet Franc? It can't be. It's more Merlot-y, right? More cherries and pennies? I didn't write down the percentage, but there's definitely some Cabernet Franc in it for sure. And this is one of the oldest estates in Saint Emilion. And I think it marries this kind of earthy fruit, herbal quality, kind of all together. And it's a pretty approachable wine. Yeah. I think it compares pretty nicely to the 22 that we tasted. 22 was a nice kind of like soft plushies to it. And we see that here, some light layers of flavor. I think it's very well made. How much is this? Sorry. $59.99. It's like orange marmalade on top of cherry pie. There's a little citrus, yeah. chocolate, a lot of chocolate. Yeah. Just sanded down to this little, sleek little, I don't know, like a boomerang or something like that. That's made of wood, but it's still elegant and aerodynamic. I'm being poetic, all right? I love it. I don't think I've ever heard boomerang. That just shows you the power of Bordeaux. Look what it's bringing out in gray here. Yeah. That's wonderful to see. Words. Communication. Yeah. I just want to close here and just get everyone's final thoughts on the vintage and maybe some guidance to customers looking to shop 2022. I think some big takeaways that we've already touched on is that it was not homogenous. I don't recommend going in blind. Do some research and listen what people are saying about how different chateaus fared. It's not as easy as even just saying this commune did super well and this commune didn't. There's just so much nuance here because it was such a difficult year. Some people figured it out and other people, it was a little bit tougher on. It was complicated. I would say that if you want to buy Vu-Certan or Cheveau Blanc or Margot wines or Palmer, then you should buy these wines on futures because they said the production is down for almost everybody, some significantly, and since it's worldwide, they're spread out across the world. If that's not the case, I would say this, go and buy 19s and 20s while they're still available. And I think I would, and then I would take my time and I would wait to taste wines after they've come in. And we have those opportunities when we do UGC in the spring or in the winter, especially if there's not a consistent spirit of a vintage. Absolutely, taste, Binny says tastings, you have an opportunity to learn, that's how you develop your palate and how you develop your cellar. Yeah, I mean, I agree with everything that's been said. There's some really good value wines out there, but those will be available when the wines come out. And I think 2019 especially, we have a lot of really, really good 2019s on our shelves right now. And I love 2019 Bordeaux. Tasted a couple of good ones today. Yep, I think it's a fantastic vintage. So if you have an itch to buy Bordeaux and you're not looking for Lafite or Margot, like Barb said, load up on 2019s now. And then in a couple of years when the 2022s come in, start, go to UGC and start tasting and find what you like. Yeah, it's, I think it's an exciting vintage. I'm looking forward to seeing how it develops the next few years. And I think there's going to be some really sensational wines coming out of this. Well, thank you for letting me tag along on this one. Cause this was fine. Thanks for joining us. Those wines were really good. And I'm imagining the good times you guys had together. Well, next time you'll have to come on the trip. Yeah, thanks, Bill. I was waiting for somebody to say that. Uninvited. Actually, you know, you can be our driver next time. Save us some money. The driver. It sure is cheaper to fly Greg to Fritz. It would be than to get a driver. Yeah. Except the joke's on me. It's one of those rickshaws. I got to drag you around everywhere. You're going to be on a bicycle? Yeah. Oh my gosh. We won't make it on time to any of the appointments. You won't be on a bicycle, but you'll have to wear a suit. I could pull off a suit. Well, thanks, guys, and thanks for sharing all your thoughts on 2022. Hopefully, it was helpful for you at home drinking and buying Bordeaux. Thanks for listening to Beryl's Bottle, the Binny's Podcast. Until next time, I'm Alicia. I'm Bill. I'm Greg. I'm Ben. I'm Barbara. Keep tasting.