Bordeaux En Primeur 2021 vintage: a triumphant year

The Bordeaux region has produced some exquisite wines in spite of Mother Nature, says Matthew Jukes.

Bordeaux vineyards
(Image credit: © Alamy)

To fully understand the 2021 vintage, you must digest the uniquely challenging weather conditions during the growing season. A series of interlinked climatic occurrences shaped this vintage such that it cannot be compared to any previous year. Last year presented Bordeaux with a volley of viticultural challenges that pushed every château to the edge of exhaustion. In many cases, they can rightly say that they triumphed over Mother Nature thanks to their tenacity, experience and tireless work ethic, and the finest wines are singular in their purity, freshness and uncommon resonance.

I drove nearly 1,000km in four days last week, tasted well over 300 wines and visited 51 individual châteaux as well as several industry-organised, larger, sub-regional tastings, and I enjoyed every minute. It has been three years since I last visited Bordeaux to taste the primeurs, and while mild Covid measures were still in place, the welcome afforded by the Bordelais was exceptional.

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1 Château Capbern (Saint-Estèphe)
2 Château Le Pape (Pessac-Léognan)
3 Château Marsau (Francs Côtes de Bordeaux)
4 Château Montlandrie (Castillon Côtes de Bordeaux)
5 Château Potensac (Médoc)
6 Château Sociando-Mallet (Haut-Médoc)
7 Croix Canon (Second wine of Château Canon)
8 Lacoste-Borie (Second wine of Grand-Puy-Lacoste)
9 Petit Cantenac (Second wine of Clos Cantenac)
10 Ségla (Second wine of Rauzan-Ségla)
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1 Château Cheval Blanc (1er Grand Cru Classé Saint-Émilion)
2 Château Ducru-Beaucaillou (2ème Cru, Saint-Julien)
3 Château Haut-Brion (1er Cru, Pessac-Léognan)
4 Château La Conseillante (Pomerol)
5 Château Lafite Rothschild (1er Cru Pauillac)
6 Château L’Eglise-Clinet (Pomerol)
7 Château Margaux (1er Cru Margaux)
8 Château Mouton Rothschild (1er Cru Pauillac)
9 Château Smith Haut Lafitte Blanc (Pessac-Léognan)
10 Vieux Château Certan (Pomerol)
Matthew Jukes

Matthew Jukes has worked in the UK wine business for well over three decades and during this time has written 14 wine books.  

Matthew regularly lectures, judges, speaks at wine conferences and runs masterclass tastings for both corporate and private clients all over the world. Matthew is also the creator of his ground-breaking initiative, the One Day Wine School, an indulgent day of tasting and learning first performed in 2006.

He has been the MoneyWeek wine correspondent since 2006 and has written a weekly column for the Daily Mail’s Weekend Magazine since 1999. His four highly-acclaimed, annual wine reports – the Burgundy En Primeur Report, the Bordeaux En Primeur Report, the Piemonte Report and the 100 Best Australian Wines – are published on his website, www.matthewjukes.com.

Matthew is one of the world’s leading experts on Australian wine and, with Brisbane-based wine writer Tyson Stelzer, runs an annual competition in Australia to find ‘The Great Australian Red’.  He was made Honorary Australian of the Year in the UK at the 2012 Australia Day Foundation Gala dinner. 

Matthew is a winner of the International Wine and Spirit Competition's Communicator of the Year Trophy.  His thoughts, recommendations and tastings notes are followed very closely by the wine world at large.