{"id":1898,"date":"2021-07-30T13:28:32","date_gmt":"2021-07-30T13:28:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/powertasting.com\/?p=1898"},"modified":"2021-07-30T13:28:32","modified_gmt":"2021-07-30T13:28:32","slug":"the-experience-of-wine-tasting-in-bordeaux-and-napa-valley","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/?p=1898","title":{"rendered":"The Experience of Wine Tasting in Bordeaux and Napa Valley"},"content":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s impossible to draw meaningful comparisons between wine tasting in France and California.\u00a0 They\u2019re both too large with too many wine growing regions to be able to say anything about one place without having a counterexample from another.\u00a0 So let\u2019s narrow the scope of the comparison to the two premier winemaking regions in each.\u00a0 That would be Napa Valley and Bordeaux, although the people of Burgundy might make a claim as well.<\/p>\n

We suppose that there were people who traveled to both regions for wine tasting in the 19th<\/sup> and early 20th<\/sup> centuries.\u00a0 We can only speak to the wine tasting experiences of the last quarter of the 20th<\/sup> century onward.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s stipulate a few differences up front.\u00a0 They speak French in Bordeaux; their history goes back thousands of years and the restaurants all serve French food.\u00a0 In Napa Valley, they speak English (and a lot of Spanish); the history there is hundreds of years old and the restaurants there serve cuisines from all around the world.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Ch\u00e2teau Palmer in Margaux, in the Medoc.\u00a0 Photo courtesy of The Drinks Business.<\/em><\/p>\n

Both are beautiful, but in different ways.\u00a0 Napa Valley has a broad lowland with mountain ranges on both sides.\u00a0 Bordeaux has three major vineyard areas: Macon on the left bank of the Garonne River, Pomerol\/St. Emilion on the right bank and Graves\/Sauternes south of the city of Bordeaux.\u00a0 It\u2019s easy to drive the length of Napa Valley in a few hours.\u00a0 You need a few days to see all of Bordeaux.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Franciscan winery in Rutherford, Napa Valley.<\/em><\/p>\n

Napa Valley\u2019s wineries have evolved from farmhouses to what we term Napa Palaces.\u00a0 In Bordeaux they have real<\/em> palaces, or at least ch\u00e2teaux.\u00a0 There are few if any rustic wineries left in Napa Valley.\u00a0 In Bordeaux many of the smaller producers don\u2019t have the magnificent castles that the famous names have, although they all seem to call themselves Ch\u00e2teau This or Domaine That.<\/p>\n

In our earliest travels to both, it was a simple matter of driving up to a winery and asking for a taste of their wines.\u00a0 If money ever changed hands it was only a few dollars; in Napa Valley they would throw in a free glass.\u00a0 There are still some places where walk-in tastings are available in Napa Valley.\u00a0 Those in Bordeaux are generally lower quality houses, mostly in the town of St. Emilion.\u00a0 The better Bordeaux tastings have long since been by appointment only.\u00a0 This trend was apparent in Napa Valley too, prior to the pandemic.\u00a0 Now it\u2019s more of a general rule.<\/p>\n

In Bordeaux, a tasting means blends featuring either Cabernet Sauvignon (Macon and Graves) or Merlot (St. Emilion).\u00a0 There are some whites, most based on Semillon grapes.\u00a0 Napa Valley tastings offer much greater variety: all the Bordeaux grapes, and those of Burgundy and the Rh\u00f4ne.<\/p>\n

The wineries in Napa Valley are closer to one another.\u00a0 You can easily visit five or six wineries and not travel more than a mile.\u00a0 That\u2019s just not the case in Bordeaux.\u00a0 On the other hand, traffic is much worse in Napa Valley (especially on Route 29) than on the main roads in Bordeaux.<\/p>\n

So finally, which region makes better wine?\u00a0 That\u2019s a question often debated at our dinner table and it has not yet been resolved.\u00a0 You\u2019d better decide for yourself.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

It\u2019s impossible to draw meaningful comparisons between wine tasting in France and California.\u00a0 They\u2019re both too large with too many wine growing regions to be able to say anything about one place without having a counterexample from another.\u00a0 So let\u2019s narrow the scope of the comparison to the two premier winemaking regions in each.\u00a0 That … Continue reading The Experience of Wine Tasting in Bordeaux and Napa Valley<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1898"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1898"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1898\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1901,"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1898\/revisions\/1901"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1898"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1898"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/powertasting.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1898"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}