2004 Gazin

This 24-hectare property in the high-priced neighborhood of Lafleur, Petrus and L'Evangile has produced a very promising 2004 that would appear to offer greater potential than the estate's 2003 and 2002. Manager Nicolas de Bailliencourt told me that the estate did a lot of green harvesting to get the yield under 50 hectoliters per hectare. "We picked the merlot during the last four days of September, then stopped for a long time before bringing in the cabernet," he told me. Some saignee was done, but extraction was gentle. Some of the malolactic fermentation was done in oak in 2004, for the first time. Incidentally, about 7% of Gazin's surface is planted to cabernet sauvignon. "We were all urged to plant some cabernet sauvignon after the '56 frost," noted Bailliencourt. "But today we'd rather have cabernet franc." Bailliencourt compared the young 2004 to earlier vintages like 1998, 1995 and 1990.