1979 Clos du Clocher

Clos du Clocher, in Catusseau, is a 14.8-acre estate in the Pomerol appellation. The estate’s Merlot-based Bordeaux is popular in Europe, but with a production level of just 20,000 bottles annually, Clos du Clocher rarely is found outside of Europe. Since the 1920s the estate has been owned by the negociant family Bourotte-Audy, and today Jean-Baptiste Bourotte is in charge. The French oenologist Michel Rolland is consulting winemaker. The Bourotte-Audy family also owns Chateau Monregard la Croix, which is a 3-acre estate adjacent to Clos du Clocher. The family says Chateau Monregard La Croix is not a second wine to Clos du Clocher, but a wine with its own individuality that happens to be made by the Clos du Clocher team. Robert Parker Jr. has called Clos du Clocher an estate with “fabulous terroir” that “consistently produces very Burundian-styled wines with a silky, supple texture that offer considerable charm and fruit.”

Pomerol is the smallest of Bordeaux’s red wine producing regions, with only about 2,000 acres of vineyards. Located on the east side of the Dordogne River, it is one of the so-called “right bank” appellations and therefore planted primarily to Merlot. Pomerol is unique in Bordeaux in that it is the only district never to have been rated in a classification system. Some historians think Pomerol’s location on the right bank made it unattractive to Bordeaux-based wine traders, who had plenty of wine from Medoc and Graves to export to England and northern Europe. Since ranking estates was essentially a marketing ploy to help brokers sell wine, ranking an area where they did little business held no interest for them. Pomerol didn’t get much attention from the international wine community until the 1960s, when Jean-Pierre Moueix, an entrepreneurial wine merchant, started buying some of Pomerol’s best estates and exporting the wines. Today the influential Moueix family owns Pomerol’s most famous estate, Château Pétrus, along with numerous other Pomerol estates. Pomerol wines, primarily Merlot blended with small amounts of Cabernet Franc and Cabernet Sauvignon, are considered softer and less tannic than left bank Bordeaux.