Château Séraphine 2017
“Clean and pure bouquet with attractive red and blue fruit with an underlying floral/violet scent that gains intensity with aeration. The palate is medium-bodied and quite plump in style, rounded in texture with soft silky tannin, laden with black cherry, raspberry and hints of dark chocolate towards the delineated finish. This is a very commendable debut for the property, the latest and welcome addition to the Pomerol firmament.”
— Neal Martin, VINOUS
“Intense notes of plum preserves, blueberry compote and Black Forest cake with notions of Chinese five spice, wood smoke and charcuterie. Medium to full-bodied, it fills the palate with rich, opulent black fruit supported by firm, velvety tannins and plenty of freshness, finishing long and spicy.
— Lisa Perotti-Brown MW
Tasting Note
The colour of the wine is dark red, almost black and shows great elegance and finesse with aromas of fine fresh black fruit overlaid with subtle smoky notes of wild strawberries, blackberries, cherries and cassis, with just a touch of spice and white pepper.
On the palate, the wine is velvety soft, displaying rich silky tannins well supported by a further impressive register of red and black fruits running through the core, with delicate hints of chocolate and mocha that combine well to present a long, pleasant and persistent finish.
Vineyard
Our vineyard has a surface of 2.2 hectares but is split into two parcels of vines. At Plince we have 1 hectare of vines, situated on a well-draining slope of sandy topsoil over clay and deep gravels and 0.4h of this plot was replanted with Cabernet Franc in April 2017 at 8000 vines per/h.
The second block at Mazeyres is 1.2h and although laid out in just one parcel, there are two distinct sections. The first part (currently in production) consists of a raised deposit of deep gravels on 0.6h and is planted with old Merlot vines. The second part sits on a gently sloping 0.6h and is a patchwork of shallow sandy soils over gravels and blue clay (smectite) and was replanted with Merlot in April 2017 at a density of 8,000 plants per/h.
Vinification
One day of cold soak (10°C) followed by alcoholic fermentation (26–28°C) for 9/10 days with regular ‘remontage’ and ‘pigeage’ and a single ‘delestage’.
Post fermentation extended maceration (30°C) for 3 weeks followed by malolactic fermentation in 300L French oak barrels (50% new, 50% second-fill) and then aged in barrels for 12–14 months.
Grape Variety: 1.2 hectares of Merlot
Alcohol: 13.5% by volume
RS: Less than 2 g/l
Production: Less than 1000 bottles
Harvest
Although the 2017 vintage will be remembered as the year of the Bordeaux frost, in Pomerol the vines were hardly touched, although many other challenges lay ahead.
After a very early bud break, harvest always looked likely to be early, but when the flowering began in mid-May things looked very promising with a good fruit set and no heavy rain until the end of June. However July was then quite mixed, sometimes sunny but often cloudy and mild and as 'veraison' began relatively early, we continued to enjoy a fairly hot and dry August.
However, rain then fell during the first half of September and whilst it was initially welcomed after the long hot spell, it also brought about lower temperatures and some serious concerns over ripening in the build up to harvest.
Thankfully, the sun returned for the second half of the month and the threat of rot or dilution receded completely and we commenced our first harvest on 6th September, storing the fruit in a cool room overnight. Early the next morning the fruit was carefully loaded onto the first sorting table and then de-stemmed using our precision CUBE system with second selection by hand before falling directly into a fermentation tank. All of our fruit processing was done by hand and gravity.
We then waited until 26th September to complete harvest and picked the parcel at Mazeyres and then moved to pick the remaining rows at Plince. Once again, the fruit was stored overnight in the winery and hand-processed the next morning.
Overall, our yields were down by 60% for what is regarded as normal in Pomerol, but the quality of our wines from this first vintage at Chateau Séraphine were well received by the Wine Press and Trade alike.