Pauillac AOC

One of the six communes (along with Listrac-Médoc, Margaux, Moulis, Saint-Estèphe and Saint-Julien) within the French Haut-Médoc area that are independent appellations and are allowed to bear the commune name on the label. Pauillac is the best known of these and lies between Saint-Estèphe and Saint-Julien. Here, sulphurisation of the wine in the barrel was introduced as early as the 18th century, following the Dutch example, to prevent secondary fermentation. The town of Pauillac, situated on the Gironde estuary, is rightly considered the wine capital of the Médoc; it was from this port that Marquis de Lafayette (1757-1834) set sail to join the American rebels and actively fight there.

Pauillac is the Cabernet Sauvignon region par excellence, nowhere else does this grape variety (complemented by Cabernet Franc and Merlot) come to the fore in wines with a typical cassis flavour as it does here. This is the typical Bordeaux blend of the Rive gauche (left bank). The red wines are deep dark, powerful, rich in alcohol and tannins, full of finesse and capable of ageing for many decades and are among the most excellent in Bordeaux. The area covers just under 1,200 hectares of vines and is divided into two extensive plateaus to the northwest and southwest of the town of Pauillac. Both are low-lying gravel banks with optimal water drainage. In the west, the soil consists of sand over stony subsoil, in the centre and in the south of gravel over layers of local stone. It is a strip of land three km wide and over six km long, divided by the Gaët stream. The climate is very similar to the rest of the Médoc.

The Pauillac area is home to 18 of the 61 châteaux that were included in the Grand Cru list when Bordeaux was classified in 1855. In terms of area, that's just under a third of all the Grand Cru estates in the Médoc. The pride of the commune are the three (of the five) Premier Cru Classé estates Château Lafite-Rothschild, Château Latour and Château Mouton-Rothschild, as well as the two Deuxièmes (2nd tier) Château Pichon-Longueville Baron and Château Pichon-Longueville Comtesse. This impressive list is continued by the Quatrième (4th rank) Château Duhart-Milon-Rothschild and twelve Cinquième-Châteaux (5th rank). Quite a few of the famous estates are associated with the names Rothschild and Ségur.

Map: By Domenico-de-ga from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA 3.0, link.
Modifications from the original by Norbert Tischelmayer 2017