The Graves is a large AC that runs to the south of the city of Bordeaux as opposed to the Medoc in the North. Like the Medoc its deep layers of pebble & stone that make superb Cabernet but there are flavour differences that wine buffs can pick out. It is said that the Romans planted the first vines here 2000 years ago but the Medocains might dispute that!

In 1987 the best areas were given their own AC of Pessac Leognan where there are some superb Chateau to be found, notably Chateau Smith Haut Lafitte, Chateau Haut Bailly & Chateau Pape Clement, Chateau Domaine de Chevalier. These are a short journey from the centre of Bordeaux (the Medoc takes an hour+ to get to by car). Some of the Graves terroir has been swallowed up city itself so you have the odd scenario of vines of wines worth £1000's per case surrounded by housing estates and busy roads! The most notable of these is Chateau Haut Brion & it's sister Chateau La Mission Haut Brion. Haut Brion is one of the 5 classified 1st Growths from 1855 and I'm often stuck in a traffic jam outside the gates gazing curiously at the vines thinking, “this can't be good for them”! There used to be many more vines where the houses, airport, roads etc now exist but the price of the land for development in this way outweighed what vineyards were worth back in the day. Thankfully Haut Brion survived with it's 1st Growth status. Another one is the tiny 5h estate of Les Carmes Haut Brion which has a brand new Philippe Starck designed winery on it and in recent years has become a collectors favourite with the wine rising in value. It's very hard to get an allocation of it these days and I was lucky I had a small one from just before it became a very hot property.

The other thing that's vital to mention about the Graves/Pessac is that they devote huge amount of land to the Sauvignon Blanc & Semillon grapes that make Bordeaux Blanc. These are amazing quality right across the price scale be it £10 to £1000. Though the top Chateau will sell their whites easily but the lesser known estates have a harder task, hence the QPR value. White Bordeaux is still not celebrated enough in my opinion. Though generally I tend to think of myself as a red Bordeaux, white Burgundy (Chardonnay) follower, since I've been a wine merchant I must say that I like white Bordeaux as much as white Burgs now. They are cheaper too. Most the Chateau mentioned above produce superb top end whites but other whites I would recommend would be Chateau Fieuzal (£25), Chateau Olivier (£25), Chateau Chantegrive (£15), Haut Bergy (£20). They all make smashing reds too. It's handy for them that they have both up their sleeve as quite often in a difficult red wine vintage, the whites will turn out much better than the reds (2007, 2011, 2013 are perfect examples of this...I loaded up on whites & Sauternes). The ‘11 & ‘13 were streets ahead of the generally thinner reds from those years.

Now I mention it, if push a bit further South from the city (about 1.5 hours drive) you will find the legendary estates of Sauternes & Barsac who produce sweet wines from grapes allowed to rot on the vine ('noble rot') which produces highly sweetened fruit & results in truly wonderful, profound wines. These are expensive to produce - you may get one glass of Sauternes from a whole vine versus a bottle of red or white Bordeaux. Also, rather unfortunately, the market for Sauternes is not huge these days & nearly all estates do not get prices that will make them rich and long term sustainable businesses. With the exception of top dog Chateau Yquem which can command £1500+ per case for their wines, with the high sugar content can fortify the ageing to much longer than a human lifetime. In recent years many sweet wine Chateau have used their top drawer Sauternes terroir to produce dry whites like in Pessac....they just pick earlier & don’t allow the rot to occur. These are often even better value for money. My personal favourite is 'G De Guiraud' the dry white of Chateau Guiraud 1er Cru Classe Sauternes. I sell this wine for £15 but it drinks like a wine double the price. It's released cheaply and they make less & less Sauternes at Guiraud these days, so I have mixed feelings, but get over them when I see a bottle of G winking at me in the cellar! I also recommend Clos des Lunes D'Argent for around the same price which is made by the Domaine de Chevalier guys.

A never go to Bordeaux without a dash down to the Graves area and there are so many Chateau that I'm yet to visit…I'm looking forward to the journey continuing!