The Mes Vignes Vintage
The bottling of which you are going to follow the production is a Cru Bourgeois from the appellation Listrac-Médoc.
This balanced blend of cabernets and merlot gives an intense, powerful, fruit driven wine that is both modern and classic at the same time. The concentration is remarkable. On the nose, the wine offers a sappy, lively framework with notes of liquorice, mint, blueberry and plums.
On the palate, the fruit becomes softer, riper (raspberry, black currant) but the muscular structure retains freshness and finesse.
This beautiful contemporary classic can be tasted after four to five years and will continue to reveal all the facets of it's complexity for about 20 years.
Wines of the Domain
The wines of Château Fourcas-Dupré are first remarkable by their intense colour of deep purple/aubergine. The aromatic palate is always highly developed and tends towards notes of black fruits, blackberry and touches of liquorice or wood smoke from maturation in oak barrel. This typical fruit profile is found again in the mouth and wraps around the fine, fresh tannins to create a balanced ensemble.
Wine making is traditional, with each varietal vinified separately for around 20 days. The must is pumped over daily during the alcoholic fermentation and temperatures are totally controlled.
The wine is then matured in 1/3 new oak barrels for 12 to 18 months and are racked every four months.
The wines of Château Fourcas-Dupré are sold through the Bordeaux wine trade and are available directly to consumers in France. They are regularly reviewed and referenced in most wine guides.
Thanks to your Mes Vignes formula, you are going to discover a magnificent growth of the Listrac… from the inside out.
Portrait of the wine-grower
Patrice Pagès
What made you want to become a wine maker?
Initially, I went to business school, but I took over the reins of the estate from my father with great pleasure. Wine is not a typical product: it is the only agricultural activity where one can follow the whole transformation chain from the vine to the bottle. A man can express himself completely through a wine and show off it's many qualities. I also went to the Institut d'oenologie de Bordeaux, where I met many wine and grape-growing professionals who helped me acquire a solid base of knowledge. I trust the people that helped me and know that even though we may not always see eye to eye, we all have the same objective. It is very rewarding, from a human perspective, to be able to share ones opinion with others. When making wine it's best to have some doubts: there are always some parameters we can't control. Making wine is an apprenticeship in patience and humility. In particular, I learned a lot from Bertand Rivoyre, a friend of my father's and an important broker in the Bordeaux wine trade.
What do you like about your job?
It's a career that is always changing. We never do the same thing twice. There's always something new to discover, throughout life. Wine is alive, and the way of drinking wine has also changed: wine lovers have become more curious and more critical. What I like most is the technical side of wine, in the cellar or in the vineyard but unfortunately that's the part I have to delegate to others.
What have you learned over the last 10 years?
During the last decade we have witnessed a veritable wine making revolution. We've realised that good wine must be made with good grapes. And that good grapes can only come from a vineyard that is in perfect harmony with it's environment (green harvest, leaf thinning…) The primary consideration is to harvest perfectly ripe, perfectly healthy grapes.
What is the philosophy of the domain?
I cannot stand excesses, in any form. Balance and harmony are the two great symbols of the wines of Bordeaux. We try to reach towards this balance, but it is an extremely delicate thing to achieve because by definition it is unstable. The parameters, such as climate, change constantly and we have to adapt our wine making each year to the particularities of the vintage.
How would you describe your wine?
A generous, spicy wine, with classic complexity and elegance: the spirit of Bordeaux! A timeless wine…
What are the principal characteristics of Fourcas-Dupré? What makes it different or special compared to other wines from the appellation?
The wines of Fourcas-Dupré rise above the pack because of their finesse and elegance, which is a result of our terroir. We have also a large proportion of Merlot on calcareous-clay soils, which give full-bodied, meaty wines that age well. Perhaps our wines are a bit less robust than other Listracs but with more complexity.
What kind of wine do you try to produce?
I am looking mainly for harmony, a balance between all the flavour elements: alcohol, acidity, tannins and use of oak that combine to make magic.
What kind of food do you like to pair with your wines?
The simpler the dish, the greater the pleasure: a true free-run chicken either on the spit or roasted, a roast of beef grilled over vine cuttings or prime rib with younger wines and veal scallops with an older vintage such as 1985. One must adapt the wine to the dish and not the contrary.
Could you describe the domain?
It's an airy, open, spacious domain situated on a plateau, close to the forest. One feels good here.
Who makes up your team today?
I am very lucky to work in perfect complicity with my chief viticulturalist, Jean-Pierre Miane and my winery master, Gilles Bergerot. We take great pleasure crafting together the wines of Fourcas-Dupré; a real success story.
What are your projects for the future?
I intend to adjust the plantings little by little, for example a bit more petit verdot… according to the terroirs. I also want to improve the crush reception area as well as add more cellar vats in order to ferment each block separately.
What impressed you with the concept Mes Vignes?
I like the direct contact with lovers of fine wines. They're people who are truly interested in the wine and not the label, curious to discover and learn, regardless of their origins or personal path. With Mes Vignes, the web wine makers will be able to grasp the multiple facets of wine and the spirit of openness that flows naturally with this knowledge. We aren't obliged to have the same point of view!
