Pessac-Leognan

At the outskirt of the city of Bordeaux, Pessac-Leognan was where the fine red Bordeaux was first started, in the 1660s, by Chateau Haut-Brion. The sand and gravel soils have supplied the good wines since 1300, when the archbishop who became Pope Clement V planted the current Chateau Pape Clement.

Pessac-Leognan is the heart of Graves, the vineyards are clearings often isolated from each other in heavily forested country crossed by shallow river valleys. The forest continues south and west from here to the Basque foothills of the Pyrenees.

With the development of the city, lots of vineyards are being taken out except the deep gravel soils of Pessac, with Haut-Brion and its neighbor La Mission Haut-Brion, Les Carmes Haut-Brion, Picque Caillou, and further out of town for Chateau Pape Clement.

Chateau Haut-Brion is a first growth showing good equilibrium of force and finesse, with hints of earth and fern, tobacco and caramel. La Mission tastes denser, riper and more savage.

In 1983 the owners of Haut-Brion bought its rival, including La Tour Haut-Brion, with the competition between the red as well as the white, with Haut-Brion Blanc and Laville Haut-Brion.

Most properties also produce some white, often of superlative quality within the same appellation. The commune of Leognan, well into the forest, has the outstanding Domaine de Chevalier, which never had a chateau and looks more a farm but the white produced is magnificently long-lived.

Chateau Haut-Bailly is another leading classed-growth in Leognan, with only red wine made which is rather unusual. Chateau de Fieuzal has posed a challenge for some time of its red and also very fine white.

Malartic-Lagraviere has similarly good wines, having modernized after being acquired by the Belgian Bonnie family in 1997. Chateau Carbonnieux is an old Benedictine establishment for its reliable white, but the red is rather light and only gaining some improvement recently.

Chateau Olivier is Bordeaux’s oldest and most haunting chateau producing both red and white and subject to long-term renewal. Most notably the facelift came from Smith Haut Lafitte in the commune of Martillac, making very successful red and white, and now having Les Sources de Caudalie, a hotel, restaurants and a grape-based spa.

Chateau Latour-Martillac is to the south and is on a more modest scale. Andre Lurton, owner of Chateau La Louviere, de Rochemorin, Couhins-Lurton and de Cruzeau, is also the driving force behind the renewal of Bouscaut, which is owned by his niece Sophie Lurton.

I have tasted the following wines from Pessac-Leognan so far:

Chateau Bahans Haut-Brion	2006
Chateau Carbonnieux	2007
Chateau Carbonnieux	2008
Chateau Carbonnieux Blanc	2008
Chateau Couhins-Lurton Blanc	2005
Chateau de Fieuzal	2001
Chateau de Fieuzal	2003
Chateau de Fieuzal	2006
Chateau de Fieuzal Blanc	2008
Chateau Haut-Bailly	2007
Chateau La Tour Haut-Brion	2004
Chateau La Tour Haut-Brion	2004
Chateau Latour-Martillac	2007
Chateau Laville Haut-Brion Blanc	1999
Chateau Malartic Lagraviere	2007
Chateau Malartic Lagraviere Blanc	2007
Chateau Olivier Blanc	2005
Chateau Smith Haut Lafitte	2007
Chateau Smith Haut Lafitte	2008