2016 Château Canon-la-Gaffelière, St Emilion, Bordeaux

2016 Château Canon-la-Gaffelière, St Emilion, Bordeaux

Product: 20168125035
Prices start from £445.00 per case Buying options
2016 Château Canon-la-Gaffelière, St Emilion, Bordeaux

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Available by the case In Bond. Pricing excludes duty and VAT, which must be paid separately before delivery. Storage charges apply.
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6 x 75cl bottle
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Description

Sometimes very small changes are sufficient to turn the fortune of an estate in the eyes of consumers and merchants. Balance and poise have returned and are almost perfect in this wonderful wine. Sweet, rich cherries and blackberries provide a wealth of warm ripe fruit which is surrounded by almost seamlessly ripe tannins. This is not a subtle wine but it is unquestionably a very, very fine one which has the potential to be one of the finest wines to grace your table in the years to come.

Blend: Merlot 55%, Cabernet Franc 40%, Cabernet Sauvignon 5%

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Critics reviews

Wine Advocate93-95/100
The 2016 Canon la Gaffeliere is a blend of 55% Merlot, 35% Cabernet Franc and 10% Cabernet Sauvignon (vines organically certified) picked from 26 September to 15 October and matured in 60% new oak. The yield is 42 hectoliters per hectare. This offers one of the most cerebral aromatics that I have encountered from this Saint Emilion estate: mineral-rich red and black fruit, quite edgy, almost flinty in style. I adore the focus of these aromas that are wired directly into the olfactory senses. The palate is very well balanced and governed by the Cabernet component. The black fruit is lifted by some lovely graphite notes that lend it a very Left Bank-like personality. It is fresh, taut and linear with a very persistent finish. Unlike other vintages of Canon la Gaffelire, I feel that this will require four to five years in bottle. As good as the 2015 last year, it might even surpass it.
Neal Martin - 28/04/2017 Read more
Jancis Robinson MW17/20
Dark crimson. Very rich sweet nose slightly reminiscent of the 'modernist' style. Rather thick and heavy. Suffers from being tasted immediately after the superior and sophisticated Ch Canon. Rather drying end. Good effort. Sincere but a tad vieux jeu. Hint of meatiness, then slightly drying tannins but good energy.
Jancis Robinson - 13th April 2017 Read more
Decanter93/100
Another successful wine in St-Émilion, with the signature of careful extraction. Well-brushed black fruits and a lovely push-and-pull effect between supple tannins, rich fruits and fresh acidity. Certified organic since the 2014 vintage. Drinking Window 2027 - 2045.
Jane Anson - Decanter.com - April 2017
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About this WINE

Château Canon-la-Gaffeliere

Château Canon-la-Gaffeliere

Château Canon-la-Gaffelière is owned by Comte von Neipperg. Located in the centre of the St.Emilion appellation, due south of St.Emilion town, the property has a similar climate to that enjoyed by both St.Emilion and Pomerol: more continental than the maritime Médoc, with generally more spring rainfall, though less in summer and winter.

Canon-la-Gaffelière's 19.5 hectares of vineyards (Merlot 55%, Cabernet Franc 40%, Cabernet Sauvignon 5%) lie at the base of the`Côtes', on relatively flat, sandy-gravel topsoil and sandy-clay subsoil.

Vinification at Canon-la-Gaffelière is traditional: up to 4 weeks in temperature-controlled-wooden vats followed by up to 18 months' maturation in oak barrels, 50% new. It is classified as a Grand Cru Classé.

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St Émilion

St Émilion

St Émilion is one of Bordeaux's largest producing appellations, producing more wine than Listrac, Moulis, St Estèphe, Pauillac, St Julien and Margaux put together. St Emilion has been producing wine for longer than the Médoc but its lack of accessibility to Bordeaux's port and market-restricted exports to mainland Europe meant the region initially did not enjoy the commercial success that funded the great châteaux of the Left Bank. 

St Émilion itself is the prettiest of Bordeaux's wine towns, perched on top of the steep limestone slopes upon which many of the region's finest vineyards are situated. However, more than half of the appellation's vineyards lie on the plain between the town and the Dordogne River on sandy, alluvial soils with a sprinkling of gravel. 

Further diversity is added by a small, complex gravel bed to the north-east of the region on the border with Pomerol.  Atypically for St Émilion, this allows Cabernet Franc and, to a lesser extent, Cabernet Sauvignon to prosper and defines the personality of the great wines such as Ch. Cheval Blanc.  

In the early 1990s there was an explosion of experimentation and evolution, leading to the rise of the garagistes, producers of deeply-concentrated wines made in very small quantities and offered at high prices.  The appellation is also surrounded by four satellite appellations, Montagne, Lussac, Puisseguin and St. Georges, which enjoy a family similarity but not the complexity of the best wines.

St Émilion was first officially classified in 1954, and is the most meritocratic classification system in Bordeaux, as it is regularly amended. The most recent revision of the classification was in 2012

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Cabernet Sauvignon Blend

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.

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