Bordeaux Champions
June 1st 2009, by GQ
A few hours after Chelsea beat Everton 2-1 at Wembley to win the FA Cup, Bordeaux became Champions of the French league on saturday night by winning away at Caen 0-1. Les Girondins pipped Marsailles to the title, and some 80,000 had gathered in front of the big screen in the city centre, in la Place des Quinconces, to witness the thrilling finale.
Bordeaux were last champions in 1999, the year we arrived here. It’s also good to see a direct wine connection, in that the Président, Jean-Louis Triaud, is the owner of two châteaux in Saint-Julien – the little-known, classified growth Château St-Pierre and the unclassified but better known Château Gloria.
2008 En Primeur: Surprise, Surprise
April 4th 2009, by GQ
We’ve just had the week of trade tastings in Bordeaux, when the world of fine wine annually descends on the region to taste the wines from the previous vintage. A few surprises too: many 2008s are far better than most outsiders would have thought, after gloomy reports of a damp summer.
The real surprise though is that there seems to be a genuine desire to launch a quick ‘en primeur’ campaign, with the possibility of the First Growths – Latour, Lafite, Margaux (above), Mouton Rothschild and Haut-Brion – coming out with an opening offer in the next couple of weeks, before most of the lower ranks. And that would be big news here as it would turn the normal routine on its head.
Oz and James visit Château Bauduc
February 10th 2009, by GQ
As Oz Clarke and James May prepare to wrap up their third series on BBC2 (Tuesdays, 8pm), here is their very first Big Wine Adventure pitstop back in August 2006.
‘How was your trip?’ I asked. ‘You’re the first living people we’ve seen’ was James’s first dejected remark to us, after their long drive south to Bordeaux. Their Wine Adventure had begun.
In hindsight, it would have been better not to mention the price of a bottle as it dates very quickly. £6.50? These were the heady days when the exchange rate was 1.47 euros to the pound, and UK duty on a bottle was a lot less.
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The Bordeaux Marathon
September 9th 2008, by GQ
We hosted a small team from Gordon Ramsay’s this weekend as they took part in the Médoc marathon on saturday. ‘Taking part’ is an apt expression because it’s more of a stage show or a carnival than a serious race. A glimpse of the 8000 competitors from all over the world, mostly in fancy dress and running through the vineyards of some of the most prestigious estates in the world, is certainly worth a detour.
Stuart Gillies, the chef from Boxwood Café in London, organised the trip as a birthday present for his boss, Chris Hutcheson. Chris is the father of Gordon’s wife Tana, and he runs the Ramsay empire while his son-in-law does his stuff in front of the cameras or in the kitchen.