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Château Rouquette

May 2008:  Gold and Silver Medals for Roquette

We were in the UK earlier this month when we suddenly started getting phone calls and emails from negotiants asking about our 2005 vintage. It turned out we had won a Gold Medal at the Concours de Bordeaux for our 2005 vintage - one of only 36 red Bordeaux Superieurs to do so. Altogether there were 3840 entries.

It is always encouraging to have one's efforts rewarded, even if it is for the 2005 vintage about which Michel Rolland famously said “If we can’t produce a great wine in Bordeaux  this year, we should pull up our vineyards and plant potatoes”. 

The Bordeaux competition is interesting as it is the only competition where it is difficult to cheat! The organisers send someone to every winery who checks they have roughly the volume of bottles claimed and then takes 4 bottles at random. With the other competitions, one sends samples, and there is nothing to stop one buying a bottle of Chateau Margaux, changing the label and entering it as one's own wine. I am sure this never happens but it could be done! Of course, the tight geographic concentration for the Concours de Bordeaux makes it feasible to collect the samples -it is restricted to the 100 appellations of Aquitaine. This would not be possible for a global competition, with wines from all over the world.

It is a reflection of the navel gazing tendency of Bordeaux that we were inundated with calls for the Gold Medal at Bordeaux, whereas when we won a special Gold Medal in Brussels we got one call - from a Dutch wine distributor. Someone recently said that the Bordelais are not interested in wine from the Burgundy, Spain,Italy or the New World. Their focus is concentrated on doing better than their  neighbour.

Our Silver Medal at the Concours de Bruxelles last month, for the 2004 Rouquette, also passed unremarked. This competition was international and attracted almost twice the number of entries as Bordeaux. Wines from 48 countries were entered.

We have now received 12 medals in the last 6 years, so we must be doing something right!

Michael Banton       30 May 2008