Every once in a while you pick up a bottle of wine that doesn’t come with a back label essay about “whispers of ancient gravel soils” or “lovingly harvested and blessed by monks”. The 2020 Chateau Trois Fonds Côtes de Bordeaux keeps it simple. The label offers just a little polite French bragging, basically the wine equivalent of shrugging and saying, “Yeah, we make wine here… it’s Bordeaux… what else do you want?” I respected the restraint immediately. But I’ll admit, seeing 2020 on the label made me a little nervous.
First glass. Medium puckeryishness (for the tannin crowd). There’s a nice medium jam thing going on, plus just a polite touch of oak. Nothing screaming for attention, no over-the-top fruit bomb nonsense. Just good, solid flavor that says, “Relax, you picked a decent bottle.”
Now here’s where the magic happened. I had it with smoked pork belly burnt ends, which are basically little cubes of meat happiness. The wine handled the smoky, fatty goodness like a champ. It didn’t disappear, and it didn’t try to fight the food. I’m not saying it made me emotional, but if somebody had played an accordion in the background, I might have started speaking fake French.
And then the real kicker: $7.99. And with my 20% discount, we’re talking serious bargain territory. That’s the kind of price where you start wondering if someone made a mistake… but you don’t ask questions. I am absolutely going back for more, assuming the other bargain-hunting wine goblins in town have not already cleaned out the shelf.
