Château Beau-Séjour Bécot 2019

The 2019 vintage in Saint-Émilion

Vintage benchmark: 95/100 (appellation benchmark, not a score for this wine)

Vintage character: A hot end of summer on rehydrated soils gave a rare balance between freshness and substance.

Overall reading of the year’s season across Saint-Émilion. An estate can depart from it sharply, in frost or hail years, where two neighbours did not make the same vintage. What this particular wine actually gave is on its technical sheet and in the scores above.

Tasting

""A purity of ripe, caressing red fruits that blends with the summer scent of a woman in full bloom, with notes of rose and dahlia. Fresh, enticing, comforting and pure on the palate, it ends on a mineral finish with chalky nuances and kitten's-tongue tannins."" - Le Figaro

The vintage

The 2019 vintage at Beau-Séjour Bécot

Over the decades, the years ending in 9 have seemed to bring us luck. Each vintage is unique. 2019 cannot be compared with recent years: it is a vintage of contrasts, as shown by the shortening of the Merlot vine cycle, while that of the Cabernets does not appear to have changed much. The grapes are the result of the vines' struggle against climatic excesses from the beginning of spring to the end of summer. At Beau-Séjour Bécot, the harvest was later than in 2018. Despite the many climatic hazards, the grapes were healthy and ripe.

Flowering took place from 2 to 18 June, over two weeks, in relatively cool, rainy weather, before a heatwave in the last week of June, with the highest temperatures on the 26th. The heatwave at the end of June and beginning of July made 2019 one of the hottest years of the decade. Good preparation of the vineyard and the water reserves stored by the soils during spring made it possible to cope well with this heatwave combined with a lack of water. On 25 July, just over 25 millimetres of rain fell. At BSB it was decided to de-leaf only the east-facing side and not to green harvest: the very dense foliage protected the grapes from the excessive heat. The deep-rooted old vines coped best.

Veraison began on 30 July, slightly uneven because of the long, drawn-out flowering; a pass through the vines removed the bunches that were still green or too far behind. The mid-August rains allowed the bunches to ripen without stress and supported yields, with a crop almost equal to that of 2018. The rain at the end of August and in mid-September completed ripening without bursting the berries.

The picking date was decisive. The Merlots were started on Wednesday 18 September and finished on Saturday 21 September at midday, with 56 pickers and a heat exchanger allowing the grapes to be vatted at temperatures between 6 and 10°C. The Cabernets were picked on 3 and 4 October. Extractions were slow and gentle, in infusion mode, with moderate pump-overs; macerations were a little longer than usual. The pips were fully ripe, with high-quality tannins.

The style is precise: a straight, pure, very balanced wine. The limestone and deep clays of BSB have left a deep imprint on this vintage.

Blend of the 2019 vintage

Figures from the 2019 sheet

• 14.5 % vol.Alcohol
• 46 hl/haYield
• 32 yrsVine age
• 56,000 bottlesProduction

Winemaking

Plot-by-plot selection.

Destemming, manual sorting, vatting at controlled temperature.

Traditional alcoholic fermentation (in 70 hl inverted truncated-cone vats). Vatting time averages 28 days.

Gentle, slow extraction in infusion mode.

Maceration protected from air (and oxidation) with the cap fully submerged.

Ageing

16 months, 65% in new barrels, 35% in ageing vats, amphoras and 20 hl oak casks.

Terroir

The estate covers 15.92 ha and produces around 56,000 bottles a year. The soil is particularly suited to producing a wine of very high quality. It is characterised by a high concentration of clay-limestone with starfish fossils (calcaire à astéries) and is also hollowed out by galleries where the wines are stored. The vineyard is planted 70% Merlot, 24% Cabernet Franc and 6% Cabernet Sauvignon, with vines averaging 40 years of age. Yields range between 30 and 38 hl/ha.