1948 Shaking with Eddie by Eddie Clarke

CLARET

C L A R E T is the red wine of Bordeaux. Many other wines are made in other parts of the world to resemble Claret; they are sold as Claret, but by honest dealers they have a qualifying description of origin, such as Australian Claret, etc. A l l Claret is more or less alike in c o l ou r ; it should be ruby red, brilliant red, never black or pink, but it differs very much in bouquet and flavour according to the species of grapes from which it is made, the soil and aspect of the vineyard where the grapes were grown, the state of the grapes and the way in which they were pressed at the vintage time and the length of time it has been kept. The reason all grapes for the making of wine are not alike is because each specie must be suited to the soil and it is the rivers that make the soil so different. There is the river Garonne which conies from the Pyrenees in the South-east, and the river Do r dogne which comes from the North-east. They both meet some little way below Bordeaux and flow together towards the Bay of Biscay as one big river known as the Gironde. The best Clarets come from the Medoc, that is the vineyards on the left bank of the Gi r onde ; the Graves vineyards on the left bank of the Garonne; and the St. Emilion and Pomerol vineyards on the right bank of the Dorgodne. There are large quantities of white wines made in the Graves districts, but even larger quantities of red wines, that is to say of Claret. There are many vineyards between the Garonne and the Dordogne, and there are also very large vineyards on the right bank of the Gironde, facing the Me d o c ; they are known by different names, Entre-deux-Mers, Blaye, etc., but they can be roughly divided into Cotes or hillside vineyards and Palus, or the wine from the lowlands vineyards, close to the Dordogne, Garonne, and Gironde, or the island vineyards in the middle of the broad Gironde.

44