One name for 5 hillsides
The Côtes are the slopes of Bordeaux that look down on its rivers. Blaye stands above the Gironde, Cadillac runs along the right bank of the Garonne, and Castillon and Francs sit on the Dordogne east of Saint-Émilion (opens in a new tab). Sainte-Foy lies farther up the Dordogne, at the eastern edge of the Gironde. They do not touch one another.
What joins them is a cahier des charges, the appellation’s official rulebook. Together they cover more than 10,500 hectares, worked by about 1,000 growers and 9 cooperatives, and make an average of 500,000 hectoliters a year, some 66 million bottles. Ninety-seven of every 100 are red.
Younger than its parts
Each hillside was an appellation before 2009. The oldest, Premières Côtes de Blaye, dates from 1936; the youngest, Bordeaux Côtes de Francs, from 1967. Their growers began working together in 1975 and formed an association in 1985. The decree of October 29, 2009, made them one appellation, with the old areas kept as place names that stand before Côtes de Bordeaux (opens in a new tab) on the label. Sainte-Foy, an appellation since 1937, joined as the 5th in 2016.
One old name survived the merger. Premières Côtes de Bordeaux (opens in a new tab) was not abolished: since 2009 it belongs to the sweet whites of the same Garonne hills alone.
The 5 place names
| Place name | Where | Colors allowed | Vineyard |
|---|
| Blaye | 40 communes on the right bank of the Gironde | Red, dry white | 6,000 hectares |
| Cadillac | The right bank of the Garonne, facing Sauternes (opens in a new tab) | Red | 1,247 hectares |
| Castillon | 9 communes on the Dordogne, east of Saint-Émilion | Red | About 2,300 hectares |
| Francs | 3 communes on high land north of Castillon | Red, dry white, sweet white | 435 hectares |
| Sainte-Foy | 19 communes at the eastern edge of the Gironde | Red, dry white, medium-sweet and sweet white | 280 hectares |
Blaye alone is more than half the vineyard. Sainte-Foy would fit into it more than 20 times.
A place name asks more of the red
The plain name, Côtes de Bordeaux with nothing before it, is for red wine only, at 55 hectoliters a hectare and 11% natural alcohol. Add a place name and the rules ask more of the red: 52 hectoliters and 11.5%, from riper grapes. Castillon goes further still, with at least 5,000 vines a hectare where the others ask 4,500, and a ceiling of 62 hectoliters where the others allow 65. The 52 hectoliters and 11.5% are the same for all 5 place names; only Castillon’s density and ceiling differ. Every red of the family is aged until March 15 and sold from March 31 of the year after the harvest, and its Malbec (opens in a new tab) must always be blended with another principal variety.
The grapes are the Bordeaux set: Merlot (opens in a new tab), Cabernet Sauvignon (opens in a new tab), Cabernet Franc (opens in a new tab), and Malbec for red, with Carmenère (opens in a new tab) and Petit Verdot (opens in a new tab) in small shares. For white, Sauvignon, Sauvignon Gris (opens in a new tab), Sémillon (opens in a new tab), and Muscadelle (opens in a new tab), with Colombard (opens in a new tab) and Ugni Blanc (opens in a new tab) to 15%. Only 3 of the 5 may make white. Blaye and Francs make dry white, and Francs a sweet white picked by hand in successive passes. Sainte-Foy makes dry, medium-sweet and sweet, the only place name with a medium-sweet wine.
Same town, different wine
Two of the place names share a town’s name with a different appellation, and the label is the only way to tell them apart. Cadillac on its own is a sweet white appellation of 22 communes on the same slopes; Cadillac Côtes de Bordeaux (opens in a new tab) is the red. Blaye on its own is a stricter red appellation drawn over the same land as the much larger Blaye Côtes de Bordeaux (opens in a new tab). Beside both sits the white Côtes de Blaye.
Two more names sound like members and are not. Côtes de Bourg (opens in a new tab), next door to Blaye at the mouth of the Dordogne, is outside the family. So is Côtes de Bordeaux-Saint-Macaire (opens in a new tab), a white-only appellation of 10 communes near Langon, whatever its name suggests.
What the label says at the table
No classification ranks any of it. A place name on the bottle says which hill the grapes grew on, and that the grower accepted the stricter rules. Côtes de Bordeaux alone says only that they grew on one of the 5, which never touch. On this label, the longer name tells you more.