‘The 2005 vintage allowed us to make excellent wine in 2006,’ said Thomas Duroux, General Manager of Château Palmer.
Duroux continued, ‘Selection was key in 2006.’ He was referring to the labor intensive — and hence expensive — job of removing underripe or diseased grapes before crushing.
Selection occurs in the vineyard during harvest when pickers remove unsuitable bunches of grapes. The process continues after the grapes arrive at the winery and are spread out on a conveyer belt. A dozen or so pairs of eyes and hands remove individual berries as they pass by before heading to the press. Not only does the labor increase production costs, the lost fruit decreases the amount of wine to be sold. So how does all this relate to 2005?
‘We made so much money with the 2005 vintage, we could afford a severe selection in 2006,’ said Duroux. And the result of that selection was an excellent 2006 Château Palmer (90-95 points), a flavor-filled wine with glossy texture and firm — yet clean — tannins.
Paul Pontallier, General Director at Château Margaux, emphasized the focus on selection in 2006. The 2006 Margaux reminded him of the 1986 Margaux, another wine he made.
‘Had we known then what we know now about selection, the 1986 would have been a better wine, like the 2006,’ he said. He thought it was a good example of what they’ve learned in the last 20 years.
‘If someone told me 20 years ago we would be making the kinds of selections we make today I would have told them they were crazy,’ he said.
The 2006 Château Margaux is incredibly smooth and suave. We tasted it side-by-side with the 2005, which was more exotic and even more polished. But much of the textural difference between the two was due to the extra year of barrel aging and recent fining of the 2005.
The 2006 Château Margaux (96-100 points) is unbelievably polished and refined, especially considering the potential for hard tannins in this vintage. Pontallier attributes the class to Margaux’s unique terroir for Cabernet Sauvignon.
‘When Cabernet is ripe here, we make great wine. And in 2006 the Cabernet (90 percent of the blend in 2006) was perfectly ripe,’ he said.
That’s the lesson of the 2006 vintage. Those properties that could afford a severe selection made the best wines.
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