Château Doisy-Daëne 2010 Barsac, Bordeaux, France 75cl

Château Doisy-Daëne is one of the fine sweet-wine estates of Barsac, a classed growth in the 1855 ranking and in the hands of the Dubourdieu family since 1924. It was long shaped by the late Denis Dubourdieu, the celebrated oenologist and professor whose work transformed the making of white Bordeaux.

This is a Barsac, made within the Sauternes family of sweet wines but from its own commune, where the wines tend to be a touch fresher and more delicate. It is built, as Barsac tradition dictates, on Sémillon with a little Sauvignon Blanc, the grapes concentrated by noble rot, the botrytis that shrivels the berries and gathers their sugars. Barsac’s cooler, limestone-rich soils help give these wines their nervy freshness.

The 2010 was an outstanding Bordeaux vintage for sweet wines, combining ripeness with the firm acidity that keeps a wine like this fresh and lifted rather than cloying. It is the sort of year that makes long-lived Barsac.

It pours a deep amber-gold and offers honey, apricot and candied citrus with a savoury note of saffron and the tell-tale lift of botrytis. Rich and unctuous on the palate, it is held in balance by bright acidity and finishes long and clean. A half-glass is often enough to close a meal, such is its intensity.

This is a wine to keep as much as to drink, with the structure to age gracefully for many years. Serve it well chilled with blue cheese, foie gras or a not-too-sweet fruit dessert, or simply on its own as the close to a meal.