Château Pichon Baron 2025

Château Pichon Baron, known in full as Château Pichon Longueville Baron, is a long-established estate in AOC Pauillac on the left bank of Bordeaux. The wine is a blend of Cabernet Sauvignon and Merlot. Pauillac's reputation rests on its soils: deep beds of gravel and large pebbles over the Gironde estuary that drain freely, warm quickly and force the vines deep for water, stressing them into concentrated, structured fruit. Cabernet Sauvignon, the backbone here, ripens late and brings firm tannin and blackcurrant; Merlot fills the mid-palate with rounder dark fruit. The wine is aged eighteen months in 225-litre French oak barriques, where slow oxygen ingress builds and polishes the tannin while the new wood adds cedar, spice and a fine toast. It is deep, near-opaque red. The nose blends dark forest fruit and blackcurrant with spice, liquorice and the graphite, pencil-shavings note typical of fine Pauillac. The palate is structured and savoury, the tannin firm and fine-grained, the finish long. This is a wine to cellar, and to decant well ahead when young. Serve at 17 to 18 degrees. It belongs with classic roast meat.