Sémillon

Identity

Sémillon is the grape of noble rot. Its skin, thinner than that of the Sauvignon Blanc it is almost always blended with, makes it the ideal carrier for the botrytis that gives Bordeaux's greatest sweet wines — but vinified dry and aged in barrel, it can also give some of the region's most full-bodied, longest-lived whites.

Not very aromatic on its own, it relies on texture, richness and, with age, a tertiary palette that belongs to the great white wines of Bordeaux alone.

History and origin

An old Bordeaux variety, Sémillon has no established parentage: the VIVC confirms no parent by markers and proposes none from the bibliography it draws on, a situation it shares in this corpus with Viognier. Its old local name, Chevrier, survives in a few historical usages.

Dominant in Sauternes and the Graves for centuries, it owes its reputation to a happy accident: the morning mists off the Ciron meeting warmer air from the Garonne set up, in certain autumns, the Botrytis cinerea that concentrates sugar and aroma on its thin-skinned berries — a mechanism whose biology has only been understood since the twentieth century, though Sauternes growers exploited it empirically long before.

In the vineyard

Sémillon buds six days after Chasselas and ripens in the second period, two and a half weeks after it — the same relative speed as this corpus's Syrah. Its vigour is medium but its yield varies enormously with soil fertility, which partly explains the gap between a deliberately limited Sauternes and a more generous dry white.

Its thin skin, an asset for botrytis, is also a weakness: it exposes the grape to ordinary grey rot in wet years, which destroys the crop instead of concentrating it if conditions are not right. It thrives on the gravel and clay-limestone of Bordeaux.

In the glass

The nose combines honey and beeswax with dried apricot and quince, a floral note of orange blossom and, in great botrytised dessert wines, saffron, a classic marker that reads more clearly in Sémillon than in Sauvignon Blanc. In aged dry whites, paraffin wax and toasted almond, a contribution of barrel ageing, take over.

On the palate, acidity varies widely (2 to 4) depending on the style, tannin is nil, body and alcohol stay full (3 to 5). Sweetness potential spans the whole scale, from a generous dry wine to the most concentrated dessert style — like this corpus's Chenin Blanc or Riesling, but with a richer, less incisive grain.

Great terroirs

Sauternes and Barsac give its highest expression: the principal grape alongside Sauvignon Blanc, where its thin skin carries most of the sought-after noble rot, on lighter soils in Barsac. In Pessac-Léognan it dominates the appellation's dry whites, often fermented or aged in barrel and built to age.

Commonly confused with

Sauvignon Blanc, its near-constant blending partner, brings the acidity and lively fruit Sémillon lacks on its own; conversely, Sémillon brings the richness and texture Sauvignon Blanc lacks alone — the two complement each other more than they are ever confused.

Chenin Blanc, this corpus's other great botrytis-prone variety, has a far higher acidity and a sharper identity; Sémillon, richer and less lively, ages toward wax and saffron rather than toward Chenin's quince and honey.