Benfield & Delamare 2003 Newsletter

Putting aside the millennium year, we've had 3 really good years on the trot with 2001, 02 and 03. The main feature of them all was that they were not particularly hot, in fact, you could almost say cool, but that they were dry, especially in the latter part, and in terms of wine quality, that dry finish to the season seems almost more important than heat.

In 2003, the good weather continued right past vintage, well into May.

Prior to 2001, and more often in the wetter years, we had suffered failed flowering of Merlot, what the French call "millanderage" or "hen & chicken" set. We've heard all sorts of theories about it. "It's the wind" say some, but then we'd had perfect set in a howling gale (1996). We knew that to some extent, it was a deficiency problem, and we also knew that failure occurred from cold and/or wet conditions at flowering. Some theorists claimed the problem could be addressed by late pruning, but if you prune late, which means the vines flower late, and if the weather goes bad then, you still have flowering failure. To overcome this, we had a regime of split pruning, ie, some early, and some late, and hopefully, the whole of the extended flowering won't get rained on... but then, 10 days of NE drizzle, as in spring 1998 (for 1999 vintage) pretty well got the lot. There has to be a better answer!

We had already figured Merlot was susceptible to slight deficiencies even when petiole analysis showed the mineral in question to be adequate, and where there were signs of deficiency, there was reduced fruit set. So for spring 1999, we treated different rows with several claimed treatments as well as various micro -nutrients.

And bingo! We had it. One of the treatments improved, but one micro-nutrient was like a switch, and among bare, or nearly bare rows of fruit, 2 rows were so heavy, we had to drop over 1/2 the crop! Since then, we've successfully set Merlot every year, whatever the conditions. Last December must surely have been a test for the program, and while we may not have to drop crop on some vines, we've still got a good crop.

Since 2001, all our red wine has been Merlot predominant.

We also had a victory last year. A proposal to create 5 rural/residential lots on the North boundary of our Oxford St. vineyard was settled just prior to hearing at the Environment Court. Not only did we put a stop to that, but we also understood the block forming our Western boundary had been bought for residential development, with our victory on the Northern front, the developers to the West abandoned their plans, and the block was on sold as a single piece. There is little doubt that if we hadn't fought, we would have been built out, and in time forced out.

We also felt rather honoured to see Michael Cooper has rated our wine a "Classic" in his review of the 2002 vintage in his 2005 "Buyers Guide".

The 2003 vintage year was a bit of a mixed bag, spring was cool, with a few frosty nail biters, but we squeaked through those to quite a good mild dry year that gave us a very good finish to the vintage. Volumes were a little down, but not that bad. I think the dry finish to the season gave us good ripening, and the resulting wine reflects that. This is definitely one of our best wines.

The wine itself is again Merlot predominant, around 65%, with the balance 25% Cabernet Sauvignon, and the remainder Franc. The wine spent 20 months in French oak, 40% new.

In the glass, the wine is almost a blackish red, soft mulberry, with a hint of coffee and spirits on the nose, a taut wine, by that, not soft or flabby, with complex soft fruits, mulberry, cherries intertwined with toasty oak, very long, rich and full on the palate. A harmonious and approachable wine yet with the backbone to stay around for some years.

More Information about past vintages