Grand Vin

Braised partridge, seared breast of duck and cassoulet.

The colder than average winter delayed the bud-break by a week compared with the usual dates. Then, a hot, sunny spring brought about even vegetation growth and led to a quick flowering as from the first days of June on exactly the same dates as the previous year. Thanks to excellent weather conditions, the setting was perfect, but the crop potential turned out to be lower than in 2004, displaying significantly fewer bunches per vine. The weather was fine and sunny throughout the whole of the summer, and above all, particularly dry: barely 100 millimetres of rainfall between May 1 and the beginning of the harvest! We had never seen such weather before. Luckily, the hot weather was not extreme. It doesn't bear thinking what such a drought would have done to the 2003 vintage! But the great terroirs (and this is partly why they are great terroirs) have an amazing capacity to smooth out nature's excesses. They seem to react with the same sense of moderation and balance which is the hallmark of the wines they produce.

Chateau Margaux a Premier Grand Cru Classé Bordeaux is one of the most famous wines in the world. Care has been lavished on the property by a line of owners with an abiding concern for the reputation of the estate. For more than five hundred years season after season generations of vineyard-workers grapeharvesters cellar-workers coopers and many other craftsmen have all played a part in making Chateau Margaux what it is today: a wine with an incomparable personality reflected in the elegant Palladian building which adorns its label. In 1977 the estate was purchased by the late André Mentzelopoulos and it is now run by his daughter Corinne Mentzelopoulos.