The air of expectancy that greets each new Bordeaux vintage reaches its annual climax during the week of tastings organised in early spring each year throughout the region by the Union des Grands Crus. Commercial necessity and the need to be among the first to register an opinion and a report about the new wines means that anyone who is anyone is in Bordeaux during that week.

It is hard to see the pattern being broken, ingrained as it is by habit and expectation, but is this actually the best time to judge the wines? It is often the case that a later tour of the châteaux can yield a few surprises.

It has been my habit for about a decade to visit Bordeaux in late May or early June. The advantages are manifold. There are fewer wine merchants about, more time to talk to the movers and shakers and samples are fresher, as those for the Union tastings are drawn well in advance to cope with the volume of visitors. Most importantly, the wines have shaken off their cold weather demeanours and taste easier and brighter. Any problematic malolactic fermentations have been completed, the wines sit more comfortably with their oak and are more indicative of the true personality of the vintage. Even more importantly, there are tables available in Bordeaux’s best restaurants!

The week-long visit this year, to taste the 2007 vintage was no exception. It should be said that the early impressions formed by the first observers during the Union tastings were not askew. This is, indeed, a light, charming and attractive vintage for early drinking, but during our visit, the successes of the year demonstrated something extra, perhaps not profundity, but certainly a level of intellectual engagement beyond our expectations. Highly impressive wines were found at Latour, Pontet-Canet, Ausone, Conseillante, Margaux and, against initial impressions, Lafite where Charles Chevalier again bemoaned the need to present his wines so early in the year. Lafite is a difficult wine to read when young at the best of times. The 2007 blossomed as generously during our tasting as M. Chevalier’s smile.

Our tastings were not exhaustive, but increasingly positive notes are found at Mouton, across the range including d’Armailhac and Clerc-Milon, Pichon-Baron, Figeac and Domaine de Chevalier, the latter in both red and white. From Sauternes, Ch. Climens was inspiring.

The success of any Bordeaux En Primeur campaign is defined by the balance between demand and supply, with demand being fuelled by the year’s reputation or pricing. In 2007 the pricing did not offer enough differential between the excellent 2006s, not helped by the decline of the Pound against the Euro. Writing this now, we know that the market for the 2007s is subdued, but let me offer a word to any canny Bordeaux watchers reading this. Do not dismiss the red wines of 2007 in Bordeaux because of a slack En Primeur campaign. When the wines are bottled and shipped, they will not cost any more than they do now. There are some very good bottles indeed in this vintage, and some will be better than expected. They will be delicious to drink before the 2005s and 2006s, and the dry and sweet wines are outstanding. I anticipate even more pleasant surprises await us. On reflection, Bordeaux 2007 may have something worthy to offer the Bordeaux devotee after all.

To read the full reviews of the properties visited during Berrys’ recent trip to Bordeaux, click here.

Behind the scenes: Ch. Gruaud-Larose

A definite favourite of ours and our customers, Ch. Gruaud-Larose produces one of St. Julien’s most full-bodied and long-lived wines and we were recently fortunate enough to offer you four of its most exceptional vintages - the 1990, 1996, 2004 and 2005. Each of these wines boast a very distinctive personality yet none of them fail to seriously impress - so what is it that makes Ch. Gruaud Larose consistently produce such high-calibre wines?

For many years Gruaud-Larose was owned by the négociants Cordier, who also own Château Talbot. It was sold in 1993 to the French conglomerate, Alcastel Alstom, which in turn sold it to the Taillan Group, owners of Chasse-Spleen and Haut-Bages Libéral, in 1997. It would be fair to say that the château has seen many changes since its conception yet there has always been one constant…the talented Georges Pauli, who, throughout all these changes has remained as régisseur and winemaker.

Gruaud-Larose now boasts 84 hectares of vineyards located on a gravel-rich plateau just to the west of Château Beychevelle. The wine is a blend of Cabernet Sauvignon (65%), Merlot (25%), Cabernet Franc (8%) and Petit Verdot (2%). Vinification takes place in a mixture of wooden vats and cement tanks and the wine is aged in oak barriques (30% new) for 18 months.

Becoming marvellously harmonious and developing complex and beguiling characteristics of concentrated black fruits, cedar, spices and liquorice with age, Ch. Gruaud Larose truly is the king of wines and the wine of kings.

On the 1st July 2008 it was announced in Bordeaux that the 2006 St Emilion Classification was invalid, and châteaux were required to remove the classifications of Premier Grand Cru Classé A or B, or Grand Cru Classé from wine labels dating from the 2006 vintage.

On the one hand this ruling is extremely disappointing and potentially confusing for consumers. The St Emilion appellation, unlike that of the Médoc, is at least dynamic in that every 10 years there are opportunities for promotion and relegation. Properties which demonstrate marked improvement are rewarded, while those who rest on their laurels risk demotion. This can be a useful safeguard against complacency and a genuine spur to improvement in quality.

On the other hand it is imperative that the assessment of the wines must be seen to be carried out in an objective and impartial manner if the classification is to be widely respected as a true reflection of the current status of properties in the St Emilion appellation. As this appears to be the stumbling block at the moment it should not be too difficult to amend the procedure so as to overcome the Court’s misgivings.

We are nearing the end of the 2007 Bordeaux en-primeur campaign, with the last few wines expected to be released in the coming days. This time of year is usually a busy and hectic one in the Fine Wine office, though this year it has been a little quiet. Our favourites have sold relatively well, though we have walked away from our allocations of a great deal of wine, largely on account of prices.

We pride ourselves in this office on not selling wine that we wouldn’t buy ourselves (funds permitting) and there have been many 2007 releases where we just couldn’t see the value. The key advantages for buying en-primeur are simple: one is assured of the provenance of the wine when it comes to drink it, one has a greater degree of flexibility in terms of bottle size (I have a penchant for double-magna) and, importantly, it is often the cheapest way to buy, the idea being that the châteaux offer the wine early at a lower price in order to help their cashflow.

The final factor has been the sticking point for a few wines this year. The strong euro hasn’t helped us by any means though the pricing policy of the châteaux has varied from the reasonable (Mr Barton, as always) to the unbelievable (plenty of examples here). Wines such as Leoville-Barton will almost certainly sell out, and should be more expensive to buy once physically available; this also holds true for Lynch-Bages, which almost invariably jumps in price at some stage (the trick is to call the timing of this jump).

Pontet-Canet and Haut-Bailly are different calls: they don’t quite have the “form” of Leoville-Barton or Lynch-Bages - we follow these wines because we know that a great deal of passion, expertise and investment is going into these properties and that they are very much on the up.

So how much is a case of wine worth? Is a case of 2007 Lynch-Bages worth £408? My answer is yes, no question. In five or ten years’ time buyers of this wine will be able to drink a bottle of outstanding Pauillac for an “on the table” price of less than £42.00. Our cheapest retail price for Lynch Bages is £66.00 for the 1994 (a vintage comparable with 2007 in terms of quality, maybe) and it’s notable that en-primeur buyers of the 1994 paid just over £180 per case for their wine…

At the time of writing we have one first growth available: 2007 Ch. Margaux at £2460 per case in bond. I personally think that the price is about right: it’s cheaper than the 2006, a quarter of the price of the heavenly 2005 and, most importantly, an excellent wine, well worthy of its status as one of the best wines in the world.

It does make the 2004 look like exceptional value at £2400 per case, though stocks of the 04 are dwindling. The release price of the 2007 is more than 150% up on the release price of the 2004, and this does prompt arguments of a lack of realism on the part of the Bordelais, though can we really argue that they should be giving their wine away when they see their previous releases more than double in price in a matter of a few years?

Well, what an interesting week. And what have we learnt? Well, 2007 was about as good as it could be given the dreadful growing season up to the end of August. It was never going to be as good as 2005, and for once no one has pretended otherwise. However good the winemaking, vineyard management and technology you simply can’t make truly sublime Claret with a wet, cold summer.

That the best producers did as well as they did was nothing short of miraculous. The very best 2007s are ripe, fruity, seductive and often very elegant wines that will provide gorgeous early drinking and in some cases will age well too.

Nevertheless, 2007 is a very inconsistent vintage. For every good wine in 2007 there are several that make you want to shout Blackadder-style (Series 1) ‘Don’t drink the wiiiiiiiiine!’ The worst 2007s are green, dilute and charmless, or where producers have tried too hard, extremely fruity but with no structure and bitter tannins.

The prize for the best appellations in 2007 goes to Pomerol on the Right Bank and St Julien in the Médoc.

Close behind are a very impressive crop of Pauillacs and the slightly inconsistent but occasionally outstanding St Emilions which provided the top 2 reds in Cheval Blanc and Ausone. Margaux was very up and down, ditto St Estèphe led by the excellent Cos d’Estournel, and Pessac with the very fine Haut Brion and Domaine de Chevalier.

Pessac-Léognan’s dry whites are the best of the lot, while the Sauternes are excellent, just lacking a touch of acidity that would bring them up to the level of the other-worldly 2001s.

There will be wines in 2007 that are stupidly overpriced and should be avoided like a Gironde lamprey in red wine. But you shouldn’t believe the harbingers of doom either – as long as you are looking to drink the wines rather than invest in them, there will definitely be wines worth buying from 2007.

To give you a bit of a helping hand we have posted the team’s top 10 overall, cellar must-haves and best value wines for 2007. BBR’s 2007 offering will be pretty slim so you can be reassured that anything we recommend will be well worth it.

I hope you’ve found the blogs interesting and we’ll all keep our fingers crossed that prices are attractive enough to tempt us all to pick up a few cases from 2007. It would be a shame not to have some of these seductive, fruity, finely balanced wines in your cellar. In the meantime, please have a look at Alun Griffiths MW’s excellent 2007 vintage report along with full tasting notes for all the 2007 wines that will be posted on bbr.com over the coming week.

And don’t forget to listen to all of our Bordeaux 2007 Podcasks featuring exclusive interviews with some of the best names in the world of wine.

I look forward to seeing you same time, same place for the 2008s, so farewell and thanks for all the fish.

As we rambled through St Emilion and Pomerol today we found it increasingly difficult to visit a château without bumping into one of the members of the Thienpont clan. (Left: Nicolas Thienpont)

It must be quite galling to own one of the greatest estates in the world and not even produce the best wine in your own family. One can probably hold off the violins for the moment but such is the lot of Alexandre Thienpont at Vieux Château Certan in Pomerol.

In 2007 he has produced an aromatic VCC (16.25/20) of great finesse and precision, closer in style to Burgundy than Bordeaux. It lacks the density of great vintages of VCC but Alexandre has got it spot on in terms of getting the most out of the vintage and not trying to force the wine to be something it’s not.

He realises that you cannot fight against nature; you can’t make a 2005 if you have a cold, gloomy summer however much green or pink harvesting you do, and however much you chaptalise or use the rarely-mentioned concentrators. So to that end Alexandre’s VCC is a success, and a pleasingly early drinking one at that.

A short leap from Alexandre is cousin Jacques (left) at the small shed of a winery that is Le Pin. It is fair to say that Jacques is cut from slightly different cloth than his quiet, modest cousin; a witty, engaging chap without any airs and graces (for a Bordelais anyway).

Certainly his warm, relaxed welcome belies the fact that he owns one of the finest, most expensive and sought-after wines in the world. It was my first visit to Le Pin and it really is as remarkable as everyone says.

A small house in the middle of the vineyards (right), its downstairs garage is home to 4 or 5 steel cuves, a few barrels and a palette or two of wine. Its simplicity makes most Burgundian estates look like Mouton Rothschild (well almost). You don’t have to ask Jacques how much wine he has made, you can just count the barrels (34 this year, for the record, poor maths notwithstanding).

It was nice to see that the future is in good hands too. His polite, well-mannered (as so many French children seem to be) young son George was working hard helping out with the En Primeur tastings. A request for some more Le Pin from some other visitors was met with a firm, albeit rather high-pitched ‘Il n’y a plus’ (There’s none left). The boy is learning fast.

As for the wine, well, like VCC, 2007 Le Pin is a Burgundy-styled Bordeaux but with the volume turned up. It had a heavenly nose, finely textured tannins, focused cassis and raspberry fruit and a finish of great intensity. An unforgettable experience. Le Pin is one place where you don’t bother asking about pricing. With the tiny quantity produced, however good it is, Le Pin is not really about value for money. It is a wine where, as they say, if you have to ask the price it is probably not for you.

The final stop on our Thienpont world tour (I’m sure there are T-shirts available somewhere) was the much lesser-known St Emilion estates of Larcis-Ducasse  (left) and Pavie-Macquin where another cousin Nicolas Thienpont (top left) is effecting a quiet revolution. We have been real fans of this estate since 2005 and 2007 did not disappoint.Both wines were excellent, and received a very solid 16/20 score.

The Larcis was more feminine with lots of fine, ripe, succulent fruit, while the Pavie-Macquin was very refined too but richer and more structured. Both should be very good value buys this year.

Cutting right to the chase (not one of my strong points), no, 2007 is not a Right Bank vintage. It is a vintage where those who worked with the cards that nature dealt them rather than trying to make a silky fruit bomb purse (or Perse, perhaps) out of a pig’s ear, made good wines.

A year where those who had the resources to invest in the vineyards during the growing season, green harvesting, pink harvesting and reducing yields to make sure only the best grapes made it into the wine, succeeded. 2007 is an inconsistent vintage – albeit one that is delicious at its best - that is all about mentality and approach not about whether your estate is situated in the Médoc or St Emilion or Pomerol.

Saying that, if you were to put a gun to my head, there is no denying that on average the Right Bank has probably done better than the Médoc. Pomerol is the most consistently high quality commune in Bordeaux. St Emilion is slightly less consistent but when its good it’s very very good. Ch. Ausone (18.5/20), Cheval Blanc (19/20) and Pétrus (18.5/20) are all better than any of the First Growths of the Medoc.

2007 is a great Cheval Blanc (19/20) in the context of any vintage – an absolute stunner, as The Sun would say, and definitely worthy of a very understandable ‘Phwoooaaarrr’. It has more complexity, power and depth than any other wine in this vintage as well as the fruit, tannin and acidity to last for decades. Ch. Conseillante (Jean-Michel Laporte of Ch. La Conseillante right) (17.75/20) is not far behind either. It is a beautiful, velvety, dense and rich with a lovely streak of minerality.

We were split on whether it was better than their excellent 2006; the only solution is probably to conduct comparative tastings as often as possible to help make up our minds…The ‘Médoc of St Emilion’, Ch. Figeac (Eric d’Aramon of Ch. Figeac left) (17/20) continues to improve too, with a finely-structured, aristocratic 2007 full of character.

Where the Right Bank wines are likely to fall down is over pricing; even the better wines from this higher category like Ch. Angélus (16.5/20) and Ch. Troplong-Mondot (15.5) are going to look a bit toppy compared to the Médocs unless they really surprise us with their pricing policy. Conversely though, the Right Bank will also offer some of the best value wines of the vintage, like Alain Vauthier’s (right) Moulin St Georges (16.75) in St Emilion and Feytit Clinet (16/20) in Pomerol.

It is surely a slippery slope when you find yourself enjoying wine before 9am in the morning but if you are going to drink anything before breakfast, it may as well be the wines of Decanter Man of the Year, Christian Moueix (left). Their office reception has the feel of a posh bank (not too far from the truth if you think about it), and they have a secret room where, beckoned by a nod and a wink, their jewel Ch. Lafleur is tasted by a privileged few (disappointingly, not including Your Man in Bordeaux). But despite these tiny criticisms, Christian can be delighted with his 2007s.

From the fruity, stylish Ch. La Fleur Gazin (15/20) right up to the extraordinarily intense and complex La Fleur-Pétrus, he has made some very good wines providing further evidence of how well Pomerol has performed in 2007. His handful of St Emilions are less impressive but he probably isn’t too worried about that in the great scheme of things.

The Bordelais are constantly coming up with weird and wonderful new ways to seduce the senses while you taste the wines at their châteaux.

You have the wine writer graffiti wall at Léoville Poyferré (right) and the incredibly modern and stylish tasting room at Latour where you look out over the vineyards while a large zebra (fortunately in painted form) looks on. The winner, without a shadow of doubt though, is Super-Second Ch. Ducru Beaucaillou (left)

When Bruno Borie took over at Ducru in 2003 his energy and revolutionary vision had an immediate effect and launched Ducru back towards the glories of decades gone by. Everything about Ducru Beaucaillou today is modern and flamboyant, from Bruno himself to his impressively seductive wines. There is undoubtedly substance behind the style, but my goodness it is not everyone’s cup of tea.

The reception room (below left) is full of modern art (or we think that is what it is) with a rabbit and ice cream theme. The tasting room (left) is like a Tube carriage from a very very psychedelic dream.

It is bright orange with shiny copper sliding doors with cut-out leaf and vine motifs. It is hard to avoid the instinct to grab a handle to ensure you don’t fall over when you reach Aldgate East. Not an easy task when you are holding a glass of wine and a copy of the latest Harry Potter novel at the same time.

Ducru has not yet fully completed its renaissance but for those who like a sleek modern style of Claret, it is well on its way. It doesn’t need bells and whistles like this to sell its wine, but as this blog obviously shows, it certainly grabs your attention. So perhaps all publicity is good publicity?

The three most important factors in this year’s Bordeaux 2007 campaign will be, in order of importance, prices, prices and prices.

Patrick Maroteau (below right) at Ch. Branaire Ducru made the point that price and quality are two separate issues. Having made a pretty exceptional wine in 2007 (17/20 BBR score) he is probably right to feel a bit aggrieved that 2007 is receiving such poor press, but there is no getting away from the fact that unless prices come down significantly there will not be many 2007 En Primeur wines that will be worth buying.

The 2007 vintage is better than many feared, for the best properties anyway, but these are soft, fruity wines for early consumption; something to enjoy while you wait for the 2005s and 2006s to mature. It is certainly not a vintage for speculation so will not be of interest to many of the wine investment customers who bought so much Bordeaux 2005.

It’s not the Bordeaux châteaux’s fault of course that the Pound is so weak against the Euro (1.25 today against 1.48 a year ago) or the dollar, nor that 2007 isn’t another 2005. But it is a huge mistake for them to think that is not their problem; it is absolutely in their interest to help restore Claret lover’s faith in Bordeaux. And at the risk of sounding like a broken record, significantly reducing the prices is the only way to do this.

Léoville-Barton’s Antony Barton (left) is, as ever, a voice of reason. Like Maroteau, he shakes his head at the negative reports emerging about the vintage; he readily admits that the 2007s are wines for early drinking, but firmly believes that they are nevertheless ‘good wines’. He sighs that several of his neighbours have told him that they have no intention of reducing their prices.

Doubtless they talked of emerging markets, which is a serious case of self-delusion as the ‘emerging markets’ are just not significant when it comes to En Primeur. Producers seem to be more open to price reductions than they have ever been, but with the strong Euro even a drop of 15-20% would result in wines that in the UK, US and Far East were the same price as the superior 2006s.

The spectre of the 1997 vintage hangs like a dark cloud over the campaign. For those of you too young to remember, 1997 was a year of charming, supple, fruity wines, not unlike the 2007s, that were horribly overpriced. After the successes of 1995 and 1996, and with allocations to protect in the run up to 2000, merchants bought enthusiastically and those that stayed in business, regretted it immensely.

From the other side of the pond, Robert Parker (left) will be publishing his views on Bordeaux 2007 at the end of April, while the Wine Spectator’s scores have already been filtering out. The fact that nothing has scored more than 93 points should certainly serve as a shot across the Bordelais bows.

Also, with today’s announcement by Robert Parker that 2005 is the finest Bordeaux he has tasted in the last 30 years (describing it as ‘out and out fantastic’), Claret lovers will need to be given a compelling reason to pick up a few cases of 2007 En Primeur as opposed to remortgaging their house and buying as much 2005 as they possibly can!

Today Jasper Morris MW and our Fine Wine Sales Director Simon Staples discussed their initial impressions of the vintage and their thoughts on Bordeaux 2007’s St Julien wines.

Listen to these discussions on our Bordeaux 2007 Podcasks.

PS Incidentally, I hope no one electrocuted themselves licking their computer screens following yesterday’s April Fool. Ironically, if your screen tasted slightly dusty, metallic and fruitless, then you would not actually have been far off the taste of some of the poorer quality 2007s!

Today saw us visit two of the behemoths of Pauillac: Ch. Mouton-Rothschild and Ch. Lafite-Rothschild. Originating from the traditional French (Lafite) and flamboyant English (Mouton) branches of the Rothschild family, there has always been a bit of needle between these two great First Growths.

The 2006 vintage was the first year in a very long time that we had preferred Mouton over Lafite. The question was whether this was a temporary blip or a sea-change in the pecking order of the First Growths.

We visited them one after another today, with Ch. Lafite first up. In line with what we had seen at other châteaux, the quality of the second wine, Carruades de Lafite, was disappointing. It did possess a glimpse of that glorious silky, Lafite texture, but it was lightweight and lacked density.

The Grand Vin, Ch. Lafite was very good indeed, but it didn’t bowl us over. The quality bar for the First Growths is incredibly high these days - and rightly so given the prices they charge - and within that frame of reference, the Lafite lacked the concentration and multi-layered complexity that marks out great vintages of this wine. Its unmistakable aethereal fruit and beguiling, lacy texture was straight out of the Lafite copybook - and if this is the main thing you look for then you will love this - but the greedy souls that we are, we just wanted more. We gave it 17/20.

Mouton Rothschild has undergone a velvet revolution in the last few years, and is so much better for it. Managing Director Hervé Berland (left) has orchestrated the renaissance with administrator Philippe Dalhuin (formerly of Branaire Ducru). However, it is nice to see that Mouton has lost none of its idiosyncratic glamour – where else would you be transported by golf carts 150 yards from the reception area to the tasting room?

With the exception of Le Petit Mouton, which continued the trend of unimpressive second wines, the Mouton stable was excellent. They were just so much riper and generous than most other wines we had tasted. D’Armailhac (16/20) was voluptuous and seductive, Clerc Milon (16.5/20) more structured and serious, and Mouton itself was the first wine to really hit the spot this week. It was sensual yet brooding, flamboyant yet elegant. It had all the concentration you could ask for along with firm yet supple tannins and a long creamy cassis finish. We decided it would be churlish to give it less than 18/20.

Who knows what will happen in 2008, but at this stage, as far as the 2007 instalment of the Rothschild rivalry goes, Mouton definitely wins the day.

At Berrys we pride ourselves on pushing back the boundaries of technology wherever we can, so we are delighted to trial a new piece of internet software with this blog. Using the process of techno-osmology you can now taste the wines for yourself by licking the wine names on your screen. Don’t worry if it doesn’t work at first. It often takes several licks for your screen to release the flavours. We’ll try to work on the aromas too for next year.

And if you can’t wait that long…don’t forget to listen to Our First Bordeaux 2007 Podcask which looks at the vintage from a Hong Kong perspective.

Nick Pegna, MD at BB&R in Hong Kong and Jeannie Cho Lee, head of the The Fine Wine School in Hong Kong give their thoughts on the vintage.