Red Bordeaux is sleek and refined
By Wine Atlas, Thursday 22 March 2007 :: Wine - France :: #139 :: rss
Don't miss: Château du Pav- illon 2005 Bordeaux, France
Style: Medium-bodied red Bordeaux, dry, balanced and subtle. An excellent example of an Old World Merlot blend.
There's an elegance to traditional red Bordeaux that sets it quietly apart from New World renditions of Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon. Château du Pavillon displays this sleek refinement in full. The wine offers pretty black and red cherry fruit, a touch of cedar-scented oak and as clear-cut an expression of "terroir" ("earth") as you're apt to find. Wines that display terroir have a sense of place, a sensory identity that reflects a specific growing region. To a practiced nose, this wine smells of Bordeaux and nothing else! Merlot dominates the blend at 80 percent, the balance made up by Cabernet -Sauvignon.
Situated in the Entre-Deux-Mers ("Between-Two-Seas") region of Bordeaux, the estate produces this dry red, a rosé in the commune of Ste. Croix du Mont, and a lovely Sauternes-style wine under the Château Les Roques label in the township of Loupiac.
These wines come to us from the family of Michigan's own Jean-Jacques Fertal: The estate's owners and winemakers are his aunt and uncle, Vivianne and Alain Fertal. Jean-Jacques is a Frenchman married to an American whose Oakland County import and distribution company, Eagle Eye Imports, has a core of French wine estates in its portfolio.
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