Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
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Wine Enthusiast
This is a smooth, ripe wine, full of warm fruits and a generous, sophisticated texture. It has balanced acidity and plenty of crispness, while at the same time a pleasant roundness and opulent midpalate. It should age well medium term.
Barrel Sample: 94–96 Points -
James Suckling
A dense and structured white with layers of ripe fruit and tannins. Full body. Lots of waxy-lemon, cooked-apple and dried-mango flavors. Traditional style. Needs three to four years to come together. Try after 2022.
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Decanter
More obviously rich than some, majoring on toasted hazelnut aromas. It has done its level best to fatten things up in a tough vintage for whites, and manages to do so extremely well, but it can't quite pull off the true minerality of the best vintages. This is well handled though, showing lovely rich citrus flavours accompanied by rosemary and cold ash, with a mouthwatering finish.
Barrel Sample -
Jeb Dunnuck
Possessing a big tropical and exotic nose, the 2016 Château de Fieuzal Blanc is a medium to full-bodied, rich, beautifully texture white that’s going to shine on the dinner table. It picks up more peach as well as a kiss of oak with time in the glass and has impressive concentration and a ready-to-go style. I’d be happy to drink it over the coming 4-5 years, and I suspect it will keep longer.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The De Fieuzal 2016 Blanc has a rich, tropical tinged bouquet with scents of guava, pineapple and mango, nicely defined and probably one of the most commercially minded dry white bordeaux. The palate is well balanced with crisp acidity, with subtle notes of orange rind and nectarine dovetailing into a lightly spiced, stem ginger finish. Certainly this is one of the better examples of its kind this year.
Barrel Sample: 90-92 Points -
Wine Spectator
A friendly style, with a creamy hint along the edges of the yellow apple, white ginger, pear, jasmine and salted butter notes. There's a pretty straw tint to the finish. Drink now through 2021.
Sometimes light and crisp, other times rich and creamy, Bordeaux White Blends typically consist of Sauvignon Blanc and Semillon. Often, a small amount of Muscadelle or Sauvignon Gris is included for added intrigue. Popularized in Bordeaux, the blend is often mimicked throughout the New World. Somm Secret—Sauternes and Barsac are usually reserved for dessert, but they can be served before, during or after a meal. Try these sweet wines as an aperitif with jamón ibérico, oysters with a spicy mignonette or during dinner alongside hearty Alsatian sausage.
Recognized for its superior reds as well as whites, Pessac-Léognan on the Left Bank claims classified growths for both—making it quite unique in comparison to its neighboring Médoc properties.
Pessac’s Chateau Haut-Brion, the only first growth located outside of the Médoc, is said to have been the first to conceptualize fine red wine in Bordeaux back in the late 1600s. The estate, along with its high-esteemed neighbors, La Mission Haut-Brion, Les Carmes Haut-Brion, Pique-Caillou and Chateau Pape-Clément are today all but enveloped by the city of Bordeaux. The rest of the vineyards of Pessac-Léognan are in clearings of heavily forested area or abutting dense suburbs.
Arid sand and gravel on top of clay and limestone make the area unique and conducive to growing Sémillon and Sauvignon blanc as well as the grapes in the usual Left Bank red recipe: Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Cabernet Franc and miniscule percentages of Petit Verdot and Malbec.
The best reds will show great force and finesse with inky blue and black fruit, mushroom, forest, tobacco, iodine and a smooth and intriguing texture.
Its best whites show complexity, longevity and no lack of exotic twists on citrus, tropical and stone fruit with pronounced floral and spice characteristics.