Château Barrail Saint André is a postage stamp sized property in Saint Emilion producing an average of 650 cases per year of rich, refined, and elegant claret that hits, as they say, well above its weight.
You can divide Bordeaux châteaux a number of ways: right bank/left bank, old school/new school, grand château/petit château. This one is Grand Château in style, petit château in scale (though many of the petits châteaux are actually pretty big), and new school in its determination to produce smooth, clean, perfumed wines.
But remember: what we call new school is the way the grandest château have ALWAYS made their wines: reduced yields, rigorously maintained vines, the use of only the healthiest fruit, clean fermentations at cool temperatures, and aging in new wood.
It costs more money to work that way, but with only 2 hectares to work with Jean-Alain Coutant decided he could shoulder the added expense and do the extra work. His reward is a wine that absolutely belongs on the same tables as the ones from the greatest châteaux with the most famous names.
Not that I'm trying to claim this is the EQUAL of Château Ausone or Pétrus. But it has the same fruit purity as wines like that, the same elegance of structure and tannin, the same subtle interplay of completely ripe fruit and perfectly air-dried new wood.
Is it as BIG as the $200+ per bottle wines? Of course not. But it's as PRETTY. The 2011 Barrail Saint André is a beauty.
The 2011 vintage has been largely overshadowed by 2010 because 2010 was so much more successful on the left bank. But in Saint Emilion, and on the right bank in general where harvests take place 7-10 days earlier than on the left bank, 2011 is another great success. THIS 2011 will blow the socks off most 2010s.
It isn't the cheapest wine in the store, but for a Grand Cru it is actually a very good value as well as an excellent wine.
Even with the explosion of wine quality around the world these last few years, Bordeaux still has a LOT to say. This is one of its most eloquent voices.
