Bordeaux-style blends

In wine, as in the movies, there are this season's blockbusters as well as those vintage collaborations that you can curl up with time after time. Joanne Simon reveals why a more discerning audience would never turn its back on Bordeaux-style blends.

If Cabernet Sauvignon is Fred Astaire, Merlot is Ginger Rogers. They're better together than apart - and their legendary film collaborations of the '30s have aged pretty well too. Just like the greatest red wines of Bordeaux.

A modern equivalent might be Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie, who sizzle during their fight scenes in Mr and Mrs Smith (an altogether different kind of choreography) and are now, according to the tabloids, seeking a real-life love-nest. But it's too soon to say whether this much-hyped "blend" will stand the test of time. A bit like the Bordeaux-style wines made everywhere except in Bordeaux, some might say...

The reason winemakers blend has become something of a cliché: "It results in a wine that is greater than the sum of its parts," says Meerlust winemaker Chris Williams. "We blend because one plus one equals three," sums up Kanonkop co-owner Johann Krige. In fact, the arithmetic gets even more complicated when you consider Bordeaux blends mostly include Cab and Merlot plus Cabernet Franc, Malbec and/or Petit Verdot. Not so much Fred and Ginger, then, as the whole cast of Friends minus, say, Phoebe - in which case the series wouldn't have been as good, hopefully proving the point about successful blends...

But what makes Bordeaux so special? In a good year, for starters, it produces about the same amount of wine as Australia (no mean feat in itself). In a good year, it also just so happens to produce more of the world's most expensive and sought-after wines than anywhere else. Margaux, Latour, Lafite Rothschild, Mouton-Rothschild, Haut Brion... The names of these First Growths will ring a bell even with quaffers of Tassies who've never heard of the 1855 Classification. As Rustenberg winemaker Adi Badenhorst puts it: "For right or wrong reasons, Bordeaux is the region everyone looks to."

Follow the Fleet
(Astaire & Rogers, 1936)
From Coonawarra in Australia to Mendoza in Argentina (with Tuscany in between), high-end winemakers across the globe have attempted to grow Bordeaux's red grapes and blend them into close replicas of the original. South Africa entered the fray relatively recently - Paarl estate Welgemeend was the first in 1979, narrowly beating Meerlust to the bottling line. Yet just a quarter of a century later, WINE magazine readers (a highly discerning lot) say our top "icon" and most internationally prestigious wines are Meerlust Rubicon, Kanonkop Paul Sauer and Vergelegen (2005 Reader Poll, June issue). And what do these leading lights have in common? You guessed it: they're all Bordeaux-style blends.

The fact is we do Bordeaux pretty darn well - and we biased locals are not the only ones who think so. UK authority Jancis Robinson MW had this to say after judging at the 2004 Fairbairn Capital Trophy Wine Show: "Some exciting Shiraz/Syrahs are emerging but South Africa's best Cabernets and Bordeaux blends are still generally much greater, more confident wines."

There can also be no stronger argument for our potential than the recent arrival, en masse, of the Bordelais themselves. The Rothschilds have been at Rupert & Rothschild since 1997 (with the famous Michel Rolland jetting in four times a year to consult). Alain Moueix, a scion of one of Bordeaux's most important families, bought his patch of Helderberg dirt in 1997, naming it Ingwe and planting the five classic varieties. "And in the past three or four years we've had a full frontal assault," comments Warwick MD Mike Ratcliffe. "Pichon-Longueville Comtesse de Lalande, Angelus, Cos-d'Estournel, Cheval Blanc, Dauriac... I can rattle off several big names from Bordeaux, whereas there's no one I can think of from the Rhône, and certainly no one from Burgundy since Bouchard moved out of Bouchard Finlayson."

So what has attracted them to our shores? Château Pichon Lalande technical director Thomas Do Chi Nam, a judge at the inaugural Calyon Trophy Bordeaux Blend Challenge earlier this year, sums it up nicely: "Most of the wines correspond to the Bordeaux red wine philosophy of a blend which is elegant, well-balanced, refined, shows freshness, harmony and, most of the time, good ageing potential ... the general elegance and harmony we appreciate so much in France."

Since he says such nice things about us, we probably shouldn't point out that his is very much a purist view of French wine. But Badenhorst doesn't pull any punches: "People always look in awe at Bordeaux as if all the wines are great, but in truth there are some 10 000 producers, and the amount of kak produced is scary. Taste any South Africa wine against 80% of Bordeaux, and we'll knock their socks off. Of course it's still a different story with the First Growths. But give us two or three years," he winks.

Shall We Dance
(Astaire & Rogers, 1937)
If the wines of Bordeaux are famed for their great subtlety, what does South Africa have to offer? "We can produce anything from something very classic that would confuse a French purist to something totally fruit-driven and easily identifiable as a New World wine," says Kanonkop winemaker Abrie Beeslaar.

"Many New World wines are like Liz Taylor - voluptuous and not much else," Krige chips in. "Kanonkop Paul Sauer, on the other hand, is like Sophia Loren - she's got class as well as big boobs! If we can put the structure and elegance of Sophia Loren in a bottle, I'm happy."

A similar analogy might be made at Meerlust: "In a good year, Rubicon has a core of fresh, juicy fruit but no heaviness," says Williams. "The problem at [some South African wineries] is that their Bordeaux-style blends tend to be their flagship, so they whack it into the best, newest barrels, and the result is a planky, tarry mess.

Judicious use of oak is essential." (Otherwise, as Krige puts it, "You end up with Liz Taylor, where all you can see are these two big American oak barrels...")

In theory, at least, there should be nothing straightforward about Bordeaux. The aim is not to express varietal character, even when a single grape is predominant (as in the Medoc, for example, where the typical "recipe" is 70% Cabernet Sauvignon, 15% Cabernet Franc and 15% Merlot). "You should be confused at first," says Badenhorst. "The wine should reveal itself slowly, layer by layer, ultimately proving much more rewarding than a single variety wine."

Because it's all about complexity, blending does not simply involve mixing a few homogenous tanks of Cab and Merlot with a cup or two of Malbec. "John X Merriman is a blend of 48 to 50 components," reveals Badenhorst. "And we bottle each component separately too so that if there is any fall-out, we can go back and say, oh, ok, the problem is that Merlot from Hospital Hill which we picked at 28° Balling."

Rupert & Rothschild winemaker Schalk-Willem Joubert insists that each component used in a premium blend like Baron Edmond must be able to stand on its own. "It's like cooking - you can't take a tough steak and some shrivelled veggies and hope to end up with a great meal. The key is to take what you get from the vineyards and put it into bottle without trying to steer it in any particular direction. In that way your style starts to emerge."

Williams agrees: "While single vineyard varietal wines are great for representing a niche area of a property, a wine like Rubicon should be representative of the whole property. Our Cab alone comes from 10 different vineyards with different soils and aspects and vines of different clones and ages."

Carefree
(Astaire & Rogers, 1938)
In Bordeaux, much is made of vintage variation - indeed, some celebrate it as further proof that their wine is superior to the reliable but boring "sunshine in a bottle" produced in the New World. However, rain in the Cape in 2002 resulted in such widespread mildew that Rubicon was declassified as Meerlust Red, and some properties opted not to release a premium red blend at all. An extreme example, perhaps, but it does suggest that things are a little more complicated down here than the French might think.

"We have just as many variations, and it's not that they're better or worse, it's just that they're different," says Krige. So apparent are these variations, moreover, that Beeslaar says the hard part is actually maintaining the distinct "Paul Sauer style" established by his predecessor, Beyers Truter.

"Hundreds of factors come into it. From the grapes, which are a natural product and therefore unpredictable, to the oak, which is also a natural product, to the human factor of 100 people working here during the harvest, consistency is always the biggest challenge."

Badenhorst, meanwhile, can be relied on to put the French in their place: "Vintage variation in Bordeaux? That's absolute crap these days! There is no vintage variation anymore thanks to Reverse Osmosis [the concentration of grape must by pushing it against a membrane to remove water, now standard operating procedure during bad years] and chaptalisation [the addition of sugar before and/or during fermentation to raise alcohol]. There's more RO going on in Bordeaux than anywhere else in the world - it certainly isn't a big thing here because our grapes do ripen."

That these vinification techniques as well as riper picking and the use of new oak (virtually unheard of until the 1980s) result in the bigger, riper, fruitier wines preferred by the world's most influential wine critic, Robert Parker Jr, is by the by. Suffice to say that the gap between Bordeaux and Bordeaux-style wines made elsewhere in the world is narrowing. "Even the First Growths have very little subtlety these days," says Ratcliffe.

Swing Time
(Astaire & Rogers, 1936)
Historically, great Bordeaux does have the ability to evolve in bottle over years, even decades. "Their acidity is traditionally higher than ours which, combined with their tannin structure, enables them to mature their wines for longer," explains Joubert. "But now that they're picking riper to make fuller wines, the question is: how long will Bordeaux last now?"

Time will tell, as indeed it will in South Africa - if we can resist drinking our wines young, that is. "Improvement in bottle is an indicator of quality," agrees Williams. "But at the same time the wine must be drinkable when it's young. I get irritated when people tell me that their harsh green tannins will soften over time. If the tannins are green now, they'll still be green in 20 years - except then the fruit will have faded too."

The inimitable Krige puts it even more eloquently: "You can't marry a woman just because your mother-in-law says you will love her in 10 years time!" But Beeslaar is at pains to point out that it's worth waiting for those secondary flavours that develop over time. "Sure you can buy a bottle of Kanonkop and enjoy it tonight. But you'll be losing out..."

Having recently tasted a "great" Alto 1966 and a "fabulous" 1957 Rustenberg, Badenhorst points out the bigger concern: "Our wines can age; it just depends how they're stored."

South Africa has certainly proved its flair with Bordeaux-style blends, with these wines winning more international trophies than any other style. Yet many now say Shiraz is our Great Red Hope. "Shiraz definitely has a bright future," says Williams, who also makes the acclaimed The Foundry Syrah. "But most wine lovers, hard-pressed to choose their favourite wine or say what they mostly invest in for their cellars, will still say Bordeaux. It's just the most satisfying wine - there's nothing more life-affirming than a good steak with a good Bordeaux!"

Beeslaar, meanwhile, says consumers seem to find Shiraz easier to drink. "And it is a nice drink," he concedes. "But you can't talk about it for hours!"
And finally, there's Ratcliffe: "I'm a businessman, so I don't get caught up in romantic notions. But to those who want to hang the South African flag on a bottle of Shiraz, I say watch out - the world's wine lake is starting to taste like Shiraz."

A FOREIGN PERSPECTIVE
California's first lady of wine, Zelma Long (above), and her viticulturist husband Phil Freese have chosen South Africa to make their high-end Bordeaux-style blends, Vilafonte Series C and Vilafonte Series M (in partnership with Mike Ratcliffe of Warwick and US-based fine-wine merchant Bartholomew Broadbent). She explains why they chose South Africa:

"The Cape has some of the most intriguing and unique terroir, a combination of very old soils; the influence of the two oceans, one very cold, one warmer; and the site diversity due to the geography of mountains and valleys. This provides an opportunity to produce wines with depth and length of flavour, balance; and yet with their own personality.

"In general we have found that Bordeaux varietals in South Africa express themselves with a distinct personality that stands apart from other New and Old World countries. The moderate temperatures and slight humidity (versus California) tend to produce grapes of rich flavours with a high level of soft ripe tannins, when properly grown."

"We felt our specific site, with rocky clay soils, would produce deep, long-lived wines, when planted in a manner and with