2015 Château Val Beylie “Plaisir”, Bordeaux Rouge AOC

Tasting Notes

‘Plaisir’ means “pleasure” in English. The wine presents a deep purple color with a clean, fruit-forward nose, smooth in the mouth with red berry candied fruit with hints of smoke and good acidity, nice and balanced on the finish. While Christophe’s first vintages were aged in barrique, his new “sans chêne” approach creates a naked example of Merlot where you can smell and taste the dense clay soil that makes Beylie’s terroir special. This is an amazing wine full of freshness and elegance.

Specs

• Varietal: 75% Merlot, 25% Cabernet Franc
• Appellation: Bordeaux Rouge AOC, France
• Organically grown grapes from estate vineyards owned by Christophe Pont.
• Elaboration: Grapes are hand-picked in small boxes for delivery to the winery. Grapes are fermented with native yeast in stainless steel tanks and left on the skins for two weeks then topped up and conserved.
• Conservation: Unoaked, aged in stainless steel for the winter and spring then bottled before the next harvest.
• Alcohol: 14.1%
• Residual Sugar: <2 g/l
• TA: 3.25 g/l
• pH: 3.58
• Production: 500 cases
• Winemaker: Christophe Pont

What’s Included

6-bottles:

• 6x 2015 Château Val Beylie “Plaisir”, Bordeaux Rouge AOC
  Case:
• 12x 2015 Château Val Beylie “Plaisir”, Bordeaux Rouge AOC

Price Comparison

Not for sale online, $216/case MSRP

About The Winery

Château Val Beylie

This small hillside estate is situated in Merignas, just across the Dordogne river from the Saint Emilion appellation boundary. While the soil and climate here are essentially the same as Merignas’ famous neighbor to the North, the culture cannot be different. Upon pulling up to the Chateau entrance expect to see children jumping on a trampoline, wooden swings cleverly wedged between Acacia trees, hand-sewn clothes drying in the sun, and pets of all shapes and sizes bounding about. The vines here may not be perfectly manicured, but they are pulsing with life – The air is loud with insect calls and flowers of all colors shoot up from the wild grass below the estate’s organically farmed vines. Christophe Pont runs all aspects of this operation with his own bare hands. The ten acre spread of Val Beylie is large enough to feed the family and small enough to avoid the need for employees – Just the right size for a man driven to keep life simple and fulfilling.

Available States

AZ, CA, CO, CT, DC, FL, GA, ID, IL, IN, IA, KS, LA, ME, MD, MA, MI, MN, MO, MT, NE, NV, NJ, NM, NY, NC, OH, OK, OR, RI, SC, SD, TN, TX, VT, VA, WA, WV, WI, WY

Estimated Delivery

Monday, Apr 29 - Tuesday, Apr 30

2015 Château Val Beylie “Plaisir” Bordeaux
6 bottles for $59.99 $10/bottle + $1.33/bottle shipping
Case of 12 for $99.99 $8.33/bottle + $1/bottle shipping

How much more are you saving by buying a full case?
(Note: tax and shipping are not included in savings calculations.)
2015 Château Val Beylie “Plaisir” Bordeaux - $20 = 16.66%

Happy Eclipse Day, everyone!!! Hopefully you have some snazzy eye protection for this afternoon!

I had the great fortune to sample the 2015 Château Val Beylie Plaisir, which is the Eclipse Day Wine available at @casemateswine!

I was really surpised to see a 2015 Left Bank Bordeaux!! The label shows this as 75% Merlot, 25% CabFranc. I tasted this wine at room temp.

The color is a robust red. I did not see any real bricking around the edges.

In the glass, this wine initially has a lot of earthy notes, with a little residual red berry echoes. After the bottle was open for 30 minutes, there were leather and tobacco aromas to complement the rich soil aromas.

On the palate, this wine was initially really astringent. The flavors of sour cherry and unripe raspberry competed with the general soil characteristic of the merlot. Once the wine had some time to air, the astringent notes faced away, leaving a solid merlot profile, along with some tart plum.

This wine definitely benefits from breathing time, as well as being served with a meal – even if it’s a simple pizza Margherita. I do think that decanting or aerating would be too much, though.

I’m eager to see the price point for this bottle. I think it still has some shelf life left.

Thank you, @casemateswine, for the tasting opportunity! It was a real pleasure!

Now – back to your regularly scheduled astronomical events…

$8.33/ bottle (12) is quite the price for a 2015 bottle of Merlot/Cab Franc…very tempting…