In Pursuit of the Juiciest Wine: Day 109 – Chateau de Ribebon Bordeaux Supérieur 2009

Tonight’s wine is Chateau de Ribebon Bordeaux Supérieur 2009, which is $14 at Mahan’s Liquor in Brockport. This is an affordable Bordeaux, which is like an oxymoron, but it’s “Supérieur,” which means it has attitude. Therefore, I assume this wine is going to try really hard to prove its worth to me. You know, it’s going to try and impress me with some sleight of hand tricks. Or maybe its just confident and knows what its all about. Its like, “I’m know I’m good, damn it!” and then it snaps its fingers. I hoping for the latter . . . I think. Either way, there’s going to be attitude.

This Bordeaux is 60% Merlot, 30% Cabernet Sauvignon, and 10 % Cabernet Franc. Usually, I think, Bordeauxs are more Cabernet Sauvignon than anything else. So odd.

The color of the wine is deep claret. Well, that’s what the back of the bottle says. I don’t think I’ll disagree.

Here’s what the whole back of the bottle says:

Variety :

60 % Merlot, 30 % Cabernet Sauvignon, and 10 % Cabernet Franc.

Color :

Deep Claret

Nose :

A gently perfumed nose of blackberry, cherry, and cassis fruit and chocolate layers with some spices and cedary notes.

Palate :

This stylish wine shows elegance and concentration with brooding fruits, delicate tannins, and cedary, integrated oak.

Complex and inviting, the structure is fine, the fruit intense, and the finish persistently long.

Assessment :

Great wines produce by Alain AUBERT (6th generation of Aubert producing wine in the region) and his daughters.

They are also producers of the famous Château La Couspaude and Château Haut-Gravet in St. Emilion.

(“St. Emilion” means they are from east Bordeaux, or the right bank.)

When I poured this into the decanter, I picked up lots of berries on the nose. The odors just wafted up. I picked up a bouquet of flowers, too. I have a feeling it has decanted enough. French wines tend to need time to breathe to open up, but we’ll see.

(I’m did my tasting notes before I read the back label, except for the color part and the blend infromation.)

So the nose. The nose has dark berries and a deep, dark forest. I also get dark chocolate. A salty, dark chocolate.

The taste is mild, but this may be because I’ve been drinking Cabernet Sauvignon almost exclusively for the past week or so. Actually, there’s not much happening on the palate. This maybe why I lean to new world wines instead. They are bigger and more pronounced. This old world wines are more subtle. So subtle they don’t even pronounce the “b” in subtle.

The more I swirl it, though, the more it opens. I’m getting dark cherries and dry raspberries and dry blueberries. Oh, and earthy, too.

The finish is chalky, which may mean it needs a little more time to open up.

I’m barely picking up the chocolate that is mentioned on the back-label tasting notes.

This wine is ok. It stands up. It’s not great, and it’s not bad. It’s ok, and it has no attitude.

It does get juicier the longer it’s open. The cherries come out more, and the dry raspberries and blueberries are no longer dry but are juicy.

I’ll say 88 points.//