Outside those five main districts, wines made in the general Bordeaux area are simply labeled Bordeaux or Bordeaux Superieur, the latter having a slightly higher alcohol content. These are usually less expensive and not as well made as those from the main districts, but the French consume a lot of these wines. Most winemakers depend on a combination of the first three to make their reds. These are not the great wines of France but the kind of simple wines French folks drink every day. This was a young, lush cabernet with lots of red fruit and some tea leaf tastes at the finish.
Tannins are the chemicals in grapes that give wine structure.
When too strong in young wines, tannins make your mouth pucker and dry out. This wine was deemed a good value for its price. My experts ranked it third in the tasting. The merlot grape in this blend came through strongly, making it much softer than the others. We detected ripe fruit in the aroma, along with cedar and burnt orange.