The Chateau l'Hermitage Mirande of Montagne-Saint-Émilion of Bordeaux

St-Emilion’s Wine Council announced its eagerly-anticipated ranking this afternoon, bringing a decade of disputes and court battles to an end. The classification awards Premier Grand Cru Classé A status to just two producers, while it also recognises 12 Premier Grands Crus Classés (B) and 71 Grands Crus Classés. These rankings can cause a winery’s value to soar – they have been likened to the Michelin guide for restaurants – so winemakers across the region awaited the results with bated breath t ...

Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon ‘space vines’ that were fired into orbit alongside bottles of Petrus 2000 have been nurtured alongside their ‘daughter’ plants in western France, said researchers in an update on the project. ‘The first “space grapes” are now visible on the canes just a few months after the replanting phase that occurred in February 2022,’ said Space Cargo Unlimited, the start-up leading the project. A total of 320 vine canes spent more than a year on the Int ...

I’m fortunate enough to taste a fair amount of fine wine each year and I have come to the conclusion that each of us is forced to build our own stylistic preferences, regardless of the appellation or classification of a wine. Instead of simply choosing a bottle of Bordeaux over Barolo, for example, most of us probably aim to drink each on the right occasion and, in doing so, carve out our individual preferences for these wines. My personal bias – which I must confess, to be fair and transp ...