April review - Tom Gilbey, marathon wine guy
Posted by Gavin Quinney on 30th Apr 2024
For this month’s missive we’re turning our attention to our great friend Tom Gilbey and his fantastic achievement of running the London Marathon while blind tasting and guessing 25 different wines en route, with a brief pause to do so every mile.
What’s more, his efforts have gone viral with over 4 million views on Tiktok alone. If Instagram’s more your thing, do follow @tomgilbeywine and have a look at his pinned marathon video for more. Tom’s exploits have been all over the media, unsurprisingly – search Tom Gilbey wine marathon. (Photo credit: Broni Llloyd-Edwards.)
Tom, who is our Tom’s godfather, is raising money for the wonderful team at Sobell House hospice who looked after his mum Caroline in her last few days. Here’s the link to his JustGiving page.
Better still, we’re donating £1.50 per six-pack (25p per bottle) for every bottle of Bauduc sold online from today until 19 May.
Added to which, if you use the temporary loyalty code TomGilbeyWine for 5% off, we’ll add 5% of your order value to our overall donation.
We also released our new 2023s this month so this gives us another opportunity to show you some of the wines now on the website.
All the best
Gavin & Angela Quinney
New 2023 whites and rosé
Our new 2023 whites and rosé are available to order for swift delivery from our bonded warehouse near London.
We bottled the wines from our 25th harvest (!) here at the start of March and we’re sure they’ll be well received, even at this early stage.
Use the temporary loyalty code MayDay24 to knock 10% off until 19 May, so the £12.95 list price becomes £11.66 a bottle, in cases of 6. Or to donate 5% to Tom’s charity, use the code TomGilbeyWine for 5% off.
There are volume discounts too – see below.
Delivery is free in England and Wales for 12 or 24+ bottles. A 6-bottle delivery costs £12.50, and 18 bottles £8 (free in Greater London). For Scotland, delivery charges apply – see ‘UK delivery’ at the foot of the site.
We also released our 2020 Crémant Blanc de Blancs and we now have a full range of magnums in smart cases of three – they really look and taste the business. Perfect for when you have a few guests round or for making an impression with a lovely present.
2023 was our 25th harvest here, as we moved from London at the end of the summer of 1999 with two small children, and ‘inherited’ the grapes on the vines a few weeks before the crop had to come in. Daniel was already here when we bought the place (Lord knows what he really thought) and Nelly joined as a trainee for the harvest and luckily we’ve held onto her ever since.
You’ll find images of our 2023 white wine harvest here.
And here, along with the reds for making the rosé.
The wines
Château Bauduc Sauvignon Blanc 2023
£12.95 a bottle in cases of 6
£27.95 per magnum, in cases of 3.
This is a classy, elegant dry white that’s crisp and refreshing but with a moreish and mouth-filling texture. 2023 was a warm season after a wet spring, and we had plenty of sun and just enough rain for the grapes to fully ripen by the end of the summer hols. 12.5% natural alcohol is the right level for our Sauvignon Blanc which is all dry-grown, with no irrigation.
The back label: ‘This was our 25th harvest, all with Daniel and Nelly in the vineyard. The house wine at Restaurant Gordon Ramsay and a special selection for Rick Stein, our estate-grown Sauvignon Blanc (90%) with a little Sémillon makes a versatile, lovely, crisp and dry white. 12.5% vol.’
Château Bauduc Sauvignon Blanc Sémillon 2023
£11.95 a bottle in cases of 6
Right now it’s a toss up between the lovely Sauvignon Blanc above and this wine, which has a healthy dollop of Sémillon in the blend. And very good it is too. We could have blended the lot but you can’t call a wine Sauvignon Blanc if it’s made with more than 15% of other grapes. And since we’re known for our ‘Sauvignon Blanc’ that wouldn’t do.
The back label: ‘2023 was our 25th harvest, all of which have been with Daniel and Nelly in the vineyard. A 60/40 blend from our Sauvignon Blanc and Sémillon vines – the classic white varieties of Bordeaux. It’s crisp and dry yet with enough weight to pair with good food. 12.5% vol.’
Volume discounts
These are listed under each product and are applied automatically to your order – you can see the discount per wine in your basket. Don’t forget to apply your loyalty code as well.
Château Bauduc Les Trois Hectares 2023
£12.95 a bottle in cases of 6
Because the seriously old vines are all jumbled up, we call it a ‘field blend’ on the back label, though that’s not an official term as it’s not all that common nowadays. While the 2022 Les Trois Hectares was richer and more lush, this has lovely balance and refreshment value. Sémillon makes a wine that’s normally lower in alcohol than our Sauvignon Blanc but they were on a par in the 2023 harvest.
The back label: ‘Our 25th harvest, all with the same team, of a single plot of Sémillon vines planted in 1947, along with 15% of Sauvignon Blanc and other old varieties in a field blend from the same block. A fine dry white for serving with good food or simply on its own. 12.5% vol.’
Château Bauduc Rosé 2023
£12.95 a bottle in cases of 6
£27.95 per magnum, in cases of 3.
We made our pale rosé from the classic Bordeaux red varieties but we harvested the grapes in early September, much earlier than for making red. We’re not looking for ripe tannins and concentrated fruit after all for this wine, but crisp acidity and summer flavours. The pale juice was quickly run off the dark skins for a light, crisp wine.
The back label: ‘Our 25th harvest. The house rosé for Rick Stein for well over a decade, we picked our red grapes early (40% Cabernet Franc, 40% Merlot and 20% Cabernet Sauvignon) and used just the free-run juice for this delicious, pale and dry wine, before pressing the skins. 12.5% vol.’
Château Bauduc Crémant de Bordeaux
Blanc de Blancs 2020
£16.50 a bottle in cases of 6
To think that we planted the vineyard for this in 2004 – exactly 20 years ago. Crikey. The vines are lovingly tended through to the hand picking in August, with the whole bunches going into the press. The juice is fermented in a chilled stainless steel vat, with a second fermentation in bottle later on by adding yeast and a little sugar to create the fine bubbles.
The back label: ‘Lovely, sparkling Crémant made in the ‘méthode traditionnelle’, using our hand picked Sémillon grapes from a single block, with a second fermentation in bottle. This dry Blanc de Blancs was aged on its lees for over 24 months for a slightly richer, fuller taste. 11% vol.’
Château Bauduc Selection case
£13.50 a bottle in cases of 6
There is a stack of different mixed cases of the latest vintages now available on the website, and this is just one of them. Added to which, there’s the Tricolore (spoiler alert – three colours), the Red Collection, a Red & White case, White Selection, Wedding Taster Case and more.
Tricolore magnum case
£27.95 a magnum in cases of 3
Our fabulous new magnums really deserve a special feature in the future but they’re worth knowing about if you’re ordering a selection of wines now. It’s the first time we’ve put our Sauvignon Blanc into this 150cl format and already we’re taken by them. They look great on the table or in a big bucket and they come in handy, extremely smart boxes of 3 magnums – and there are lots to choose from. See the photo below.
They’re slightly more expensive pro-rata than bottles because the cost of a magnum is about four times that of a bottle from our suppliers, not double as you might expect.
(£12.95 per bottle in a case of 6)
