Is it rude to ask how old you are?
The East Asian market has already spent somewhere upwards of $700 million on Bordeaux futures from the 2009 vintage. But it's the trend, not the volume that is raising eyebrows in the fine wine engine rooms of Bordeaux, Hong Kong and London. Farr Vintners, a top global fine wine merchant, released its figures for the 2009 En Primeur (futures) campaign citing 15% by volume sold to East Asia, and yet 40% by value.
So the East Asian market buys expensive wine - in fact it has been a bumper year for top labels such as Lafite, now selling for a record breaking $24'500 USD for a case of 12 bottles - but who is buying this, and what will happen to the wines once customers take possession two years from now?
The thing that has both wine lovers and old-hand wine speculators glum is the worry that a lot of these are going to disappear down the hatch as soon as they hit Asian soil. So? What's the problem? Wine is basically a rather fancy foodstuff - its entire purpose in life is to give pleasure when consumed, isn't it?
For fine, expensive wines the answer is resoundingly NO - especially for top Bordeaux reds from the magnificent 2009 vintage. Wine is a living fluid. It ‘ages' like a living creature. While a six-year-old child is very cute, you can't say it has already reached its peak as a living entity - neither mentally, nor physically.
Ok. Maybe a flawed analogy, but go with me on this. The child has yet to reach half its potential - even if you do get an early glimmer of future character. Just so with a wine.
In flavour terms, this means that your bank-busting 2009 Chateau Lafite, if drunk immediately post-release in 2012, will not taste of very much. The fruits, savouries and multitude of what will one day be beautiful aromas, will be locked into a cocoon of tannin and acidity. For the '09 Lafite, this may take ten or fifteen years to even begin falling away, eventually releasing a fabulous profusion of delicate and definable aromas and flavours.
To a lesser degree, the same with Steven's En Primeur Bordeaux 2009 Selection. The wines will be bottled in a little over a year, but if you were to pop the cork of, say, the Haut Batailly, or the Rouget, you would taste something like a tough, liquid version of balled up, fruity, iron. The complexity is there, but is so concentrated that it is very hard to define any singular flavours.
Most of the wines in this selection will not begin to come into their own until at least 2013/2014, and if well stored will still be drinking beautifully in 2025, and one or two probably in 2035, depending on the wine. (Call me for details). Actually some friends and I had a lovely 1981 Chateau Lanessan (see our Bordeaux '09 selection), picked up in France on a recent trip. In went beautifully with a hybrid English/Gujarati Christmas lunch of Thali, roast chicken and black pudding, in a flat off Peddar Road.
The other issue that has connoisseurs so depressed is that roughly the same amount of very fine Bordeaux is made today as 20 years ago. Yet we are in the odd position that not only has the market exploded, but a larger percentage of production is being consumed far too early. The result of this sad infanticide is that in 20 years there will be far less fine, aged Bordeaux than is available today, driving prices up to probably absurd levels.
Lesson? Invest now - both for the benefit of your palate and your wallet. These fine Bordeaux, however, only comprise a tiny volume percentage of the international wine trade.
However, 2009 Bordeaux is not representative of the average Aussie Shiraz, or French Sauvignon Blanc doing the rounds of the international wine trade. Most wines are designed to be drunk young.
So how do you tell which is which?
How old is too old?
Unsurprisingly, it's all about the money. These fine Bordeaux wines cost a lot to make, and are therefore dear to buy. It takes a great deal of care and expense to produce an ‘age-worthy' wine, and the vast majority of wines flying around the globe are designed for instant satisfaction.
There is a lingering perception in the marketplace that all wine has to ‘age', to reach some undefined flavour pinnacle before it is ready to drink. And if you are spending any amount of money on a wine - say, over 3000 Rupees - it is more likely that what you are purchasing is robust and long lasting. Many wines arrive here at their peak, and also they tend to age more quickly in India. So even here, I would advise immediate consumption, rather than risk exposing this delicate living product to the on-and-off vagueries of the A/C system in your kitchen or living room.
It's difficult to put an exact figure to it, but certainly more than 90% of the wines currently floating around the market here in India are designed to be consumed within a year or two of bottling. I have been presented with ten year old Beaujolais Nouveau (!?), brown Gavi (a usually vibrant Italian white wine) with bits floating (shake well before serving!!), and all sorts of dead, petrified plonk by well-meaning friends.
Response: a sweet, tired smile and a vague promise that ‘of course we'll open it later on'...
The gifting cycle sees some pretty effective murder. Occasionally you come across a poor specimen, tortured from hand to hand, from one non-air conditioned living room to the next, ignored and neglected, often out of a misplaced sense of respect. However, when they reach my house, they are laid to rest with due ceremony - either a grand burial down the sink, or mummification into vinegar for use in salads.
Red or white, anything below 2000 Rupees you can be pretty sure doesn't need to sit cooking for three years on the sitting room counter top. Inexpensive, or ‘entry level' European wines, are largely for local, seasonal consumption, and New World entry level wines, although often better designed for travel, are also made in mind of markets with high turnover (Britain, US, HK, Scandinavia and Japan), where they're intended to fly off the shelves within a few weeks.
There are too many variables in India, from transport, to storage, to human handling, and nine months on even a reliable temperature controlled shop shelf is enough to sap most wines of energy. Store in a cool dry place and drink up asap.
Our wines are a little tricky. Of the coming ‘France and the World' Discovery Selection, specifically check out the Chateau Fontareche - a wine that could do with a bit more time in bottle. Compare this to the Stonyfell Shiraz from Australia -vibrant, complex and yet bottled for immediate consumption. We buy well, and therefore have the unusual ability to promote age-worthy wines in our ‘entry level' Discovery Selection.
If you picked up a bottle of our fabulous Steven Spurrier Selection Rioja from Spain, you will have noticed that it too is concentrated (although still delightful) - despite the bottle age. Like Bordeaux, good Spanish Rioja ages well. However, Spanish wineries have an interesting tradition of holding onto their wines until they feel that the they are ready to drink. This can often be for up to five or eight years, and sometimes even twenty!
A bit patronizing to the consumer? Well, how about the Bordeaux '09 in China?
Let's see if those Bordeaux producers start moving in the same direction - holding back larger quantities for release far in the future, protecting their finer wines against the ravages of the modern consumer...?
Myles Mayall
WSI Wine Buyer
(22) 4345 9114
