2003 Smith Haut Lafitte

Technical director Fabien Teitgen had not yet added any press wine to this chateau's wonderfully concentrated young 2005, made from a crop level of 35 hectoliters per hectare. The harvest here was late for the area, beginning on September 24 for the merlot and lasting until October 10. Not surprisingly, the young 2005 has a fairly high pH of 3.8 and 13.3% alcohol. The 35% merlot component seems especially successful here. Co-owner Florence Cathiard expressed the opinion that good water retention in the clay subsoil at Smith Haut Lafitte (as at some other Pessac-Leognan properties, such as Haut-Bailly) made a big difference in this drought year.

Even following what co-owner Florence Cathiard described as "a drastic pruning," it was necessary to carry out a green harvest at the end of July and beginning of August to reduce the crop load. "The clusters were huge, and the grapes were large too," said Cathiard. According to technical director Fabien Teitgen, picking the white grapes was easy, but the red wine harvest was tricky as there was not enough phenolic maturity early on despite good grape sugars. The cabernet here was ultimately harvested from October 13 to 18 with a large team of pickers. The rain during the harvest, though, did not have much of an effect. "The vines did not need water, so they didn't absorb much, and the grapes didn't swell," explained Teitgen. Following a saignee of 10% to 15%, the vinification was gentle and fairly cool. Teitgen did some quick two-minute pumpovers ("like an infusion"), but relied mostly on manual punchdowns to keep the cap wet. He then did up to 40 days of post-fermentation maceration at a fairly cool temperature.

Fabien Teitgen, who has been technical director here since 2001, vinified the 2003 with 70% to 80% whole clusters, then carried out a long but gentle cuvaison, keeping the fermentation temperature low and using only the most minimal pigeages (just a few minutes every two days) to keep the cap wet. The estate also experimented in 2003 by doing a portion of the alcoholic fermentation in barriques (60 barrels' worth, to be exact), using the method introduced by Girolate, except that Smith Haut Lafitte took advantage of a large stainless steel entry point on the front of its barrels through which the fruit could be more easily inserted. While owners Florent and Daniel Cathiard, as well as Teitgen, are not convinced that alcoholic fermentation in barriques is an especially valuable innovation, there's little doubt that their young 2003 is an especially pliant, sweet, fruit-driven wine. The yield was a very low 25 hectoliters per hectare, alcohol is close to 13%, and the pH is a high 3.9.