2007 Ch. Belair St Emilion

Chateau Belair-Monange

Château Belair, a St. Emilion Grand Cru Classé property is owned by Madame Dubois-Challon who is also co-owner of Château Ausone. Her late husband Jean purchased it in 1916. The same "régisseur" responsible for the rise in quality of the wines of Ausone over the past 20 years, the "philosopher-winemaker" Pascal Delbeck has also been responsible for improvements in quality at Belair.

The 13-hectare Belair vineyard is situated mainly on the St. Martin limestone plateau and the average age of the vines is 35 years including some that were planted around 1900. The blend is typically 70% Merlot and 30% Cabernet Franc.

The winemaking is meticulous with the grapes are hand picked into plastic baskets then sorted, de-stalked, gently crushed and transferred into stainless steel tanks by way of a moving conveyor belt using a prototype machine known as the Vinosaur. The wine is aged in 60 per cent new oak barrels the wood for which is selected and dried in the open air at Belair. About 55,000 bottles produced each year.

Cabernet Sauvignon Blend

Cabernet Sauvignon lends itself particularly well in blends with Merlot. This is actually the archetypal Bordeaux blend, though in different proportions in the sub-regions and sometimes topped up with Cabernet Franc, Malbec, and Petit Verdot.

In the Médoc and Graves the percentage of Cabernet Sauvignon in the blend can range from 95% (Mouton-Rothschild) to as low as 40%. It is particularly suited to the dry, warm, free- draining, gravel-rich soils and is responsible for the redolent cassis characteristics as well as the depth of colour, tannic structure and pronounced acidity of Médoc wines. However 100% Cabernet Sauvignon wines can be slightly hollow-tasting in the middle palate and Merlot with its generous, fleshy fruit flavours acts as a perfect foil by filling in this cavity.

In St-Emilion and Pomerol, the blends are Merlot dominated as Cabernet Sauvignon can struggle to ripen there - when it is included, it adds structure and body to the wine. Sassicaia is the most famous Bordeaux blend in Italy and has spawned many imitations, whereby the blend is now firmly established in the New World and particularly in California and  Australia.