Tag Archives: Grand Vins

Petrus — The Super Bowl of Wine

Published on March 11, 2018

I finally got a chance to try one of my bucket list wines–a bottle of 2006 Petrus from Pomerol. My wife and I originally bought it for our early December wedding anniversary, but then I got a cold, so we shelved that idea.

We were going to open it up for Christmas Eve, but another cold hit. So we decided to hold off till we both were 100% healthy and entirely on point with our tasting sensibilities before cracking into this baby. My tasting notes (and whether I think it is worth the cost) are below after a bit of geeking.

The Geekery

What makes Petrus, Petrus?

As Clive Coates notes in Grands Vins: The Finest Châteaux of Bordeaux and Their Wines, the phenomenon of Petrus as a cult wine for Bordeaux lovers is a relatively new creation. As recently as the post World War II years leading up to 1955, the wine merchant Avery’s of Bristol had exclusive rights to buy up virtually all available allocations of Petrus–which it usually did–but would struggle to find buyers.

While there is some evidence of winemaking at the estate dating back to the 1750s, the first recorded mention of Petrus can be found in the 1837 notebooks of the merchant house Tastet and Lawton. Here the estate was owned by the Arnaud family and considered the third best property in Pomerol behind Vieux Château Certan and Trotanoy. In pricing, it fetched far less than the top estates of the Medoc and only a third of the top estates of St. Emilion such as Ch. Belair. But its reputation for quality was soon to be discovered, as David Peppercorn noted in his work Bordeaux. At the 1878 Paris Exhibition Petrus won a gold medal–becoming the first wine from Pomerol to earn such an achievement.

The fortune (and pricing) of Petrus began to change in the 1920s when its owner, M. Sabin-Douarre, started selling shares of Petrus to the proprietor of his favorite restaurant in Libourne, l’Hotel Loubat. The restaurant’s owner, Madame Loubat, continued purchasing shares from Sabin-Douarre until she was the sole owner of Petrus.

The Loubat and Moueix Era

When my wife and I were in Bordeaux, we drove around for at least 40 minutes through Pomerol trying to find Petrus. We kept passing by the property. It was so unassuming and not what we expected.

Stephen Brook notes, in The Complete Bordeaux, that at this point Petrus was being priced on par with the Second Growths of the Medoc. However, Mme. Loubat wanted everyone to know the high quality of Petrus and began demanding higher prices.

In 1943, she hired Jean-Pierre Moueix as the sole agent in charge of not only distribution of her wine but also production. Soon Petrus was never priced below the acclaimed Premier Grand Cru Classé ‘A’ estate of Cheval Blanc. It was also beginning to rival the First Growths of the Medoc.

Moueix started out owning Ch. Fonroque in St. Emilion before beginning his négociant business–mostly to help sell his estate wine. When Mme. Loubat passed away in 1961, she bequeathed Moueix a single share of Petrus while splitting the rest between her niece and nephew. Over the next few years, Moueix gradually bought out Loubat’s heirs and assumed full ownership of Petrus by 1969.

Today the Moueix family owns several estates in Bordeaux including Trotanoy, La Fleur-Pétrus, Hosanna, Latour à Pomerol, La Grave, Lafleur-Gazin and Ch. Lagrange in Pomerol; Ch. Bélair-Monange and Clos La Madeleine in St. Emilion as well as Dominus, Napanook, Othello and Ulysses in Napa Valley.

The Blend (or lack thereof)

While historically Petrus has kept a small parcel of Cabernet Franc on the property, they have been gradually replacing them all with Merlot. The 2006 vintage I tasted was 100% Merlot.

Why So Expensive?

The grounds of Petrus with vineyards to the right. The weather was gorgeous the week we were there, with it only raining on our last night, so we didn’t get to experience the muddy clay sticking to our shoes.

Petrus certainly has distinctive and unique terroir. Wine writer Oz Clarke describes it in his work Bordeaux as “…one of the muddiest, most clay-clogged pieces of land my shoes have ever had the ill luck to slither through.”

Petrus sits on a “button-hole” of blue muddy clay which covers a subsoil of gravel that is followed underneath by a virtually impenetrable layer of hard iron-rich crasse de fer. The soil is around 40 million years old compared to the 1 million-year-old gravel soils surrounding the Pomerol plateau. The dense, hard smectite clay causes the vine to struggle as its roots cannot penetrate deep. However, the soil amply retains moisture. This trait becomes invaluable during warm years and dry summer months when the risk of hydraulic stress is high. As Jeff Leve of The Wine Cellar Insider notes, there is no other wine producing region in the world that has this soil structure.

There are about 50 acres of this unique soil in Pomerol.

While neighboring estates like Vieux Château Certan, La Fleur-Pétrus, La Conseillante and L’Evangile have some parcels featuring this terroir, Petrus is the only estate exclusively planted on this soil with 28+ ha. Additionally, Petrus is located on the top of this gently sloping button-hole which allows for better drainage during wetter years.

The vines of Petrus are relatively old with some parcels dating back to 1952. The root systems of other parcels are even older because of (interestingly enough) the 1956 frost that devastated the Right Bank. It killed nearly 2/3 of Petrus’ vines. However, Mme. Loubat refused to replant completely and instead attempted the untested technique of recépage. She ordered her workers to graft the new vines onto the established root-stock. The move was criticized by viticulturists and other estate owners who thought that these vines would only produce for a few vintages. However, decades later these vines are still viable.

High Priced and Labor Intensive Viticulture

I wasn’t brave enough to go up and touch the building.

The Moueix family spares no expense when it comes to tending the vines, with severe yield restrictions of 32 to a max of 45 hl/ha (3 tons an acre) with some years going as low as 17.5 hl/ha. In contrast, many well-regarded estates frequently harvest at 60-70 hl/ha.

If inopportune rains hit close to harvest, Moueix will rent a helicopter to hover over the vines and dry them off. In 1992, they covered the entire vineyard in plastic sheeting to avoid excess moisture seeping into the ground. They wanted to avoid any chance of the rain plumping up the berries and diluting flavors.

Like with top Sauternes, harvest is done at Petrus on a berry by berry basis with vineyard workers manually picking the individual grapes off the vines. These 100% de-stemmed berries are then hand sorted with an optical sorter joining the process only since the 2009 vintage.

Limited Supply and Very High Demand

After fermentation and malo, the wine is aged in 50% new French oak for 18-20 months before going through a rigorous selection process. During this time the winemakers narrow the barrels down to only the very best that will go into the final Grand Vin. Anything that doesn’t meet the grade is sold off as anonymous Pomerol. It’s every Bordeaux insider’s dream to figure out where these “discard barrels” of wine go.

Here is where we ultimately get down to the most significant cost driver. Each year, the estate produces only around 2,500 cases (30,000 bottles) of a single wine.

I honestly don’t think they will ever make gummy bears from Petrus like they do with the 5 million+ bottles of Dom Perignon.

Compare this to the 31,000+ cases of Ch. Latour, the 10,000+ cases of Opus One or even the 5 million+ bottles of Dom Perignon produced virtually every year. The scarcity and high demand mean that so few people will ever get a chance to try this wine. Those that do, unfortunately, have to pay dearly.

The Wine

So how was it? I knew that this was a wine that really should’ve been holding onto for at least 15-20 years and, even then, given a good several hours of decanting. But this was more about sharing a moment with my wife. So we popped it open when she got home and watched it evolve as we cooked and savored dinner.

Pop and pour

Medium intensity nose. Red fruits–plums, raspberry and a little earthy funk that is not defined but intriguing.

Palate has medium-plus acidity, very juicy and fresh, with medium tannins and medium-plus body. The red fruits carry through and then WHOA the mid-palate jumps with an assortment of spice that I will need some time to piece out. Minute and half long finish right now.

After an hour and a half in the decanter

Nose is now medium-plus intensity with the spice notes coming out more with a little herbal thyme. The fruit is also more rich deeper and dark–like Turkish fig and black currants.

The palate is still juicy with medium-plus acidity. The spices are getting a little more defined–making me think of Asian cuisine with tamarind fruit, star anise, coriander seed and pink peppercorn.

After 3 hours

Would St. Peter rob Paul to drink Petrus?

Still medium-plus intensity nose but a little tobacco spice has joined the party. Still has the mix of Asian spice with black currants and a smidgen of eucalyptus. Pretty remarkable how this keeps evolving. Truthfully, I can only imagine how much more evocative this would get if I had the patience and restraint to milk this out over several more hours.

The palate is still incredibly juicy with medium-plus acidity. The wine seems to works against any desire to ration and be restrained. The mouthwatering acidity makes you want to take another sip and then another. The tannins have gotten more velvety at this point. The finish has topped out at about 2 minutes with the cornucopia of spices being the last notes.

The Verdict

So is it worth $2600 (when I got it in November 2017) to now at $3000 a bottle?

Kinda.

It truly is a remarkable wine that enchants you as it continuously evolves in your glass. Not just hour by hour but sip by sip. It’s an experience that I’m quite pleased to have had but, at the same time, it is not necessarily an experience that I feel compelled to ever splurge on again.

As I mentioned in my reviews of the Samuel Adams’ Utopias and the Pappy Van Winkle 20 yr, a lot of the cost (and subsequent pleasure) for these Veblen goods often comes from the hunt to finally acquire them. For me, getting a chance to try a Petrus was a bucket list item–just as jumping out of an airplane and meeting Jancis Robinson is. It is always a thrill to check a bucket list item off.

I’ll also somewhat borrow an analogy from my Behind the Curtain post about wine pricing. In many ways, drinking a wine like Petrus is like attending the Super Bowl.

How much would you pay for one night of entertainment?

With only around 70,000 tickets for a single game each year, how many people in their lifetime get a chance to watch the game in person?

Ask yourself, how much of a premium would you pay for the privilege of attending a game that could very well suck (especially if your team loses)? And what are you really paying for but just a single night of an experience that is over after a few hours? How different is that from sharing a single bottle of wine?

My wife is a native Boston girl who was a Patriots season ticket holder during the crappy years. We finally went to Super Bowl in 2017 when the Pats played the Falcons.

Now compare that to how much you pay to attend a regular NFL playoff game, a regular season game, a college game or even your local Friday night high school game? Of course, you can argue about the potentially superior play of NFL players playing at the pinnacle of their profession but, likewise, you can debate the potentially superior terroir of Petrus, the craftsmanship of Pappy Van Winkle, the uniqueness of Utopias, etc.

The truth of the matter is–no one needs to attend the Super Bowl just like no one needs to try Petrus. There are a lot of great football games at all different levels. Likewise, there are lots of great wines at all different price points. Whether or not it is “worth it” is purely about how much the experience means to you.

For me, they were both worth it.

After attending the Super Bowl once and tasting Petrus once, I treasure both experiences. I am grateful that I had those opportunities.

But I don’t feel like I ever need to do either again. When I think of all the other things I could do for the same costs (travel, enjoy multiple bottles of Ch. Angelus, Ch. Palmer, etc.), I am content to happily check those things off the bucket list and move on to the next experience.

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Getting Geeky with 2007 Léoville Poyferré

Amber LeBeau in Bordeaux, Wine reviews

Published on February 26, 2018

Going to need more than 60 Seconds to geek out about the 2007 Ch. Léoville Poyferré from St. Julien.

The Geekery

The history of Léoville Poyferré is intimately connected to its fellow 2nd growths, Léoville Las Cases and Léoville Barton, dating back to the 1638 vineyard founded by Jean de Moytie. Along with Ch. La Tour de Saint-Lambert (now Ch. Latour) and Ch. Margaux, this estate–known then as Mont-Moytie–was one of the first estates to produce wine in the Medoc.

Over the next couple centuries, the estate was the source of much innovation in Bordeaux, identifying some of the current Bordeaux varieties for their smaller berries and higher quality wine as well as utilizing the use of oak barrels and sanitizing them with sulfur.

In 1740, Clive Coates notes in Grand Vins the estate was acquired by Alexandre de Gascq, the Seigneur of Léoville. Under his stewardship, the estate grew to almost 500 acres.

During the French Revolution, a quarter of the estate was sold off and eventually became Léoville Barton. In 1840, the estate was divided again when Pierre Jean de Las Cases inherited 2/3 of the estate with his sister, Jeanne, passing her share to her daughter, the wife of Baron Jean-Marie Poyferré de Ceres.

In the 1920s, Léoville Poyferré came under the ownership of the Cuvelier family where it joined the family’s holdings of Ch. Le Crock in St. Estephe, Ch. Moulin Riche in St. Julien and Ch. Carmensac in the Haut-Medoc (which was later sold in 1965 to the Forner family of Marques de Caceres fame in Rioja).

At first, the Cuveliers delegated management of the estate to the Delon family from Léoville Las Cases as the two properties were interconnected with adjoining chais. In 1979, Didier Cuvelier took over management and began overseeing not only massive vineyard replanting but also renovations in the cellars. He brought in first Emile Peynaud and then, in 1994, Michel Rolland to assist in consulting.

2006 vintages of Léoville Barton and Léoville Poyferré on sale at a wine shop.

Coates quotes the famous Bordeaux wine merchant Nathaniel Johnston as describing Léoville Poyferré as having the best terroir of the 3 Léoville estates with their vineyards being second only to the First Growths in potential. Most of the vineyards are located on gravelly soils on the west side of the famous D2 road across from Las Cases that is on the river side.

Further inland near the Pauillac border with Ch. Batailley is the almost 50 acres of Ch. Moulin Riche. Declared a Cru Bourgeois Exceptionnel in 1932, Stephen Brook notes in The Complete Bordeaux that until 2009 it was treated as a second wine of Léoville Poyferré. Since 2009, Pavillon de Poyferré has been the estate’s second wine.

Brook describes the style of Léoville Poyferré as the most opulent and hedonistic of the 3 Léoville estates with Léoville Barton being more classic and structured while Léoville Las Cases is more concentrated. Coates compares Poyferré to being the Mouton-Rothschild to Las Cases’ Latour.

The 2007 vintage is a blend of 65% Cabernet Sauvignon, 24% Merlot, 7% Petit Verdot and 4% Cabernet Franc. The wine spent 18 to 20 months aging in 75% new oak with around 20,000 cases made.

The Wine

Medium-plus intensity nose. While there is still some dark fruits like cassis and blackberry, the nose is dominated by savory notes of cedar cigar box, earthy forest and smokey spice. Very evocative and mouth watering bouquet.

While the seductive and silky mouthfeel hints at being a St. Emilion, the tobacco spice and cedar cigar box notes gives the 2007 Léoville Poyferré away as a St. Julien Cab dominant blend.

On the palate, the smokey notes become more leathery and meaty while the dark fruits from the nose become more muted. Medium-plus acidity adds to the mouthwatering while the medium tannins have a silky, velvety curve to them. If it wasn’t for the tobacco spice and cedar cigar box, I can see myself being fooled into thinking this was a Merlot-dominant St. Emilion with the velvety mouthfeel. The finish is regretfully short for how savory and delicious the palate is.

The Verdict

As I noted in my review of the 2011 Ormes de Pez, you can’t overlook the issues of problematic vintages like 2007. A wet, mildew ravaged late spring was followed by an unusually cool and rainy summer. By the time more ideal weather came in September, the acidity of many wines were dropping faster than the flavors were ripening. This produced wines that Jancis Robinson noted are often “… characterised by what they lack: alcohol, acid, ripe tannins, flavour.”

But the truism that good wine can still be made in rough vintages is still apt and this 2007 Léoville Poyferré is a perfect example. Many estates responded to the troubles of 2007 by being more selective in the vineyard and winery and making less (but hopefully better) wine. While Léoville Poyferré usually makes around 31,000 cases a year, in 2007 they made around 20,000.

Really poor lighting but the 2006 Léoville Poyferré I had back in 2013 was outstanding too. You almost can’t go wrong with this estate.

It is not a great wine by any means, the short finish gives it away as well as the fact that there is so much tertiary aging notes emerging in a relatively young 10+ year old Bordeaux. This is not a wine that you want cases of in your cellar.

But it is still an absolutely scrumptious wine that is drinking very well now and will probably continue to give pleasure for another 3-5 years. With a Wine Searcher average price of around $83 for the 2007 vintage it certainly offers good value compared to the 2008 ($94 ave) and 2006 vintages ($97 ave) that people are cracking into now.

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Getting Geeky with 2008 Sarget de Gruaud-Larose

Amber LeBeau in Bordeaux, Wine reviews

Published on February 20, 2018

Going to need more than 60 Seconds to geek out about the 2008 Sarget de Gruaud-Larose from St. Julien.

The Backstory

Clive Coates notes in Grand Vins that the 2nd Growth estate Ch. Gruaud-Larose was formed in 1757 when two brothers, one a priest and the other a judge, pooled together their inheritance and purchased adjoining vineyards to create the 116 hectare (≈ 287 acres) property. Wine that was in high regard and commanded prices almost on par with estates like Ch. Latour and Margaux had been produced on the property for sometime prior to the brothers’ involvement.

The Gruaud brothers were known for their eccentricities, particularly the judge, who would hoist different flags on the property after harvest to signal what nationality he felt that year’s wines would most appeal to. A British flag would be raised if the wines were going to be full-bodied and firm, a German flag if they were going to be soft and supple and a Dutch flag for a style that was a mix of the two.

The magistrate also garnered a reputation for alienating the merchants and négociants with his business practices. Each year when the previous vintage was ready to be sold, he would go to the market center and set his price for the vintage. If his price wasn’t met, he would leave only to come a few months later with an even higher asking price for his unsold wine. In what seems like a foreshadowing of the future tranche release and en primeur systems, M. Gruaud would keep raising his price until eventually the merchants capitulated else wise the price would be higher the next time he returned.

In 1778, the property passed to the magistrate’s daughter and son-in-law, Joseph-Sébastian de La Rose, who affixed the name Larose to the estate. Larose would also go on to establish the large Haut-Medoc estate of Ch. Larose-Trintaudon located on the border of Saint-Laurent and Pauillac.

The author at Gruaud-Larose.

The estate would change hands multiple times and in 1867 the two families who jointly owned the property split it up into two estates–Ch. Gruaud Larose Sarget and Ch. Gruaud Larose Faure (sometimes labelled as Ch. Gruaud Larose-Bethmann). The two estates co-existed until the early 20th century when the Bordeaux négociant family of Cordier bought first the Sarget portion in 1917 and then the Faure portion in 1935 to reunite the two properties.

Founded in 1877, the Cordier négociant house became a significant player during World War I when they landed the exclusive contract to supply the daily wine rations for the entire French Army. Flushed with income, they were able to acquire numerous estates over the next several decades beyond Gruaud-Larose, including the St. Emilion estate Clos des Jacobins, the Premier Grand Cru Classé Sauternes estate Ch. Laufarie-Peyraguey, Ch. Meyney in St. Estèphe, the 5th Growth Haut-Medoc estate of Ch. Cantemerle and the 4th Growth St. Julien estate of Ch. Talbot.

Today, Gruaud-Larose is owned by the Merlaut family under their Taillan Group which also includes the 5th Growth Pauillac estate of Haut-Bages Libéral, the 3rd Growth Margaux estate of Ch. Ferrière, Ch. Chasse-Spleen, Ch. Citran and several others in Bordeaux, the Loire and the Rhone.

The Estate

Bottles from the 1815 vintage of Gruaud-Larose in the estate’s cellar.

While still a large estate by Bordeaux standards with over 200 acres planted to vines, Ch. Gruaud-Larose has seen it size reduced somewhat since the 18th century. However, it is still one of the few estates whose vineyards have remained relatively the same since the property was classified in 1855.

The majority of the vineyards are on the southern side of St. Julien between Ch. Lagrange and Ch. Brainaire-Ducru. There is a parcel further west next to Ch. Talbot and another plot of vines located on the boundary of St. Julien and the commune of Cussac, across the road from the Haut-Medoc estate of Ch. Lanessan. While the average age of the vines are 40 years old, the estate owns several plots that are more than 100 years of age. All the vineyards are sustainably and organically farmed with around 100 acres farmed biodynamically.

Jeff Leve of The Wine Cellar Insider notes that Gruaud-Larose is unique in St. Julien for not only having the most clay soils in the commune but also for being located at the highest elevation on the St. Julien plateau.

After the retirement of winemaker Georges Pauli, Eric Boissenot has served as consultant for the estate.

Wine Stats

Ch. Gruaud-Larose produces around 540,000 bottles a year with about 45% of the yearly production being declassified to the second wine of Sarget de Gruaud-Larose. Named after the mid-19th century owner, Baron Jean Auguste Sarget, the wine spent 18 months aging in 30% new oak.

In 2008, the blend was 57% Cabernet Sauvignon, 30% Merlot, 8% Cabernet Franc, 3% Petit Verdot and 2% Malbec with around 15,100 cases made.

The Wine

A lot of cedar cigar box notes in this wine.

Medium-plus intensity nose. Very cigar box with tobacco spice and cedar. Underneath there is some red fruits like currant and plum.

On the palate, those cigar notes carry through and bring an even more savory, meaty element. Medium-plus acidity maintains freshness and adds a little juicy element to the red fruits. Medium tannins still have some grip but are rather mellow at this point. Moderate length finish ends with the same cigar box notes that have dominated this wine from the beginning.

The Verdict

With the 2008 edition of the Grand Vin of Gruard-Larose going for around $90, the 2008 Sarget de Gruaud-Larose is a very solid second wine at around $35-40.

It is a classic St. Julien that would certainly appeal to folks who like old school, savory Bordeaux. While the tannins are softening, the wine has enough acidity and structure to still be drinking well for at least another 3 years.