Why are some Bordeaux wines so expensive?
This French region is home to several of the most expensive wines in the world, from Petrus to Le Pin… but is it the soil? The winemaking? Or just historical hype? Julien Miquel investigates…
Transcript:
00:00:00:00 – 00:00:31:14
There are fundamental things that I think most people absolutely do not realize enough about Bordeaux wine and Pomerol in particular, how exceptional those wines are, and why Pomerol produces the single most expensive wine in Bordeaux and the most iconic wine in the world. I think you absolutely need to know about it. Hello and welcome to your new Bonner Private Wines video, where we learn together everything that you need to know about wine, weekly.
00:00:31:14 – 00:00:59:10
I’m your host, Julien Miquel, Bordeaux trained winemaker. Yes, I spent the past 25 years or so making and tasting fine wines from all around the world. After making my debuts as a winemaker at Chateau Margaux, one of the first top growth of Bordeaux. And today we are continuing our wine in five series. Five things that you need to know about all the top wine appellations around the world.
00:00:59:12 – 00:01:43:20
After looking into Margaux and Pauillac and Saint-Emilion in Bordeaux, also Rioja and Barolo, we’re going to cover the whole world. So we covered Spain and Italy and a lot of France. Today, I want to explain the depth of Pomerol, why it’s such a fantastic appellation. So let’s get into it.
00:01:43:22 – 00:02:11:15
Have you heard about the delicious Merlot grape part of the Bordeaux blend? By the way, you can learn everything about Bordeaux in my dedicated, full length video right here. I know Merlot has faded away and made a bit out of fashion in favor of Pinot Noir. After the sideways movie early in the 2000s, because merlot doesn’t work that well under certain hot climates like California, and it needs a bit of a specific terroir, which we’ll talk about in a second.
00:02:11:15 – 00:02:41:01
But if there is one place where merlot is and has always been exceptional, it’s in Pomerol. Don’t disregard or disqualify or discredit merlot before you’ve actually tasted a very good Pomerol like one of those we’ll talk about in a minute. Pomerol wines are generally 100% merlot, with sometimes a little bit of Cabernet Franc, and they are unquestionably 100% world class wines of exceptional quality and longevity.
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As we’ll discuss more also in a moment. So how is Pomerol so good? What? What’s happening here? Why is it so good?
00:02:55:05 – 00:03:22:02
Well, Pomerol is a tiny village, and it is one of Bordeaux’s smallest appellations, in fact, hence its scarcity. Keep that in the back of your mind for later. It’s on the right bank of the Gironde River. So soils contain more clay overall than gravel. So a cooler terroir generally, which favors merlot more than Cabernet Sauvignon because the latter needs a lot more heat, not Merlot.
00:03:22:02 – 00:04:02:18
Secondly, Pomerol has a totally unique terroir because there a few meters of depth underneath the surface are deep and extremely rich layers of blue clay. This is the type of clay that you could probably use for pottery, for crafting pots and crockery. An extremely fine and dense clay. Clay is usually not very good for viticulture. It’s too rich and fertile for vines and good wine in general, but here the clay is so thick it dries out and cracks up and cuts the vines roots in summer underneath the surface.
00:04:02:18 – 00:04:28:04
So it is not a full time clay soil yet it provides the vines with the water that they need because it absorbs a lot of water and even more importantly, it gives the merlot grapes of Pomerol their exceptional fineness of tannins. If you’ve ever tried a good Pomerol wine, you would have noticed how exceptionally fine grained the tannins are and how dense the texture is.
00:04:28:04 – 00:04:55:07
Because Pomerol is an absolutely unique, tiny area which is underneath, these very deep blue clay terroir and clay infuses a layer of finesse into the tannins. I can’t stress this enough. It’s just a very, very rare soil type in the world and perfect for Merlot.
00:04:55:09 – 00:05:22:06
As I’ve just talked about, Pomerol wines are extremely finely textured, very dense tannins, but also being merlot. It’s specific of merlot. It’s one of its features. They are very smooth in texture, very soft, very mellow. Despite being really dense in general, which is also really rare in the world of wine. This density, combined with the fact that Merlot is perfectly ripe here.
00:05:22:08 – 00:06:01:18
It’s never too cooked or jammy because it’s not that hot, the terroir in Pomerol, this gives wines a fantastic balance, which in turn makes them exceptionally aged worthy. Pomerol wines are some of the most long lived bottles that you can buy. Legendary vintages like of Petrus—which we’ll talk about more in a second, the legendary wine—are from vintages like 1945, 1950, 61, 70, and a lot more recent ones, of course, meaning that those wines can aged for many, many decades more than most of even the most famous chateaux of the left Bank.
00:06:01:20 – 00:06:24:20
By the way, while you are comparing appellations here, don’t forget that at the end of the video we’ll rate Pomerol on our World Wine Appellations leaderboard. So we’ll see how it ranks in the world compared to other appellations like Margaux or Saint-Emilion. So make sure to stay tuned. And perhaps it is time also to give us a little like, a little gesture, and subscribe while you’re down there.
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If you’re enjoying this video, go on. Oui, oui. Merci beaucoup, mon ami.
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If there’s one name people associate with Pomerol in Bordeaux in general, it is this wine from this tiny winery called Petrus. It is essentially the most expensive bottle of wine and just a legend everyone talks about, but that very few people have ever seen. Let alone tasted about all of. Have you ever seen, I don’t know, of Petrus or tasted it?
00:06:59:16 – 00:07:21:19
I’d be curious to know how many of you have and in which circumstances. Let me know your experience with Petrus in the comments. We don’t even know how many bottles of Petrus are made each year, but it’s not many. Probably around 30,000 per year. Why is Petrus such an icon and so good? Well, it’s actually quite hard to pinpoint.
00:07:21:21 – 00:07:53:07
Just in summarize very simply there and probably on the very best spot for growing vines in Pomerol. Just the best soil on this already exceptionally good terroir of Pomerol in general. They just have the best little area on there. And then because they’ve been so famous for so long, the attention to details from the winery staff, the knowhow accumulated by tourists and winemakers for many decades delivers the crème de la crème.
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While scarcity makes the stellar pricing at the same time.
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The three most expensive Pomerol wines right here, and I’ll give you a few more affordable names as well to try to get a real feel for what is Pomerol. Petrus, the most expensive one, sells for about $4,100 a bottle. Those are global wine prices across all vintages according to Wine Searcher, then is Le Pin, at around $3,700 a bottle, made famous by raging reviews given by Robert Parker in particular a few decades ago.
00:08:33:21 – 00:09:11:00
You can watch more about what I personally think about the influence of Robert Parker in this video right here. And for the third one, we drop quite a few bucks with La Fleur that retails for only about $1,000 a bottle. But don’t worry if you only have $300 to spend on a bottle of exceptional wines that your grandchildren will be able to taste, you can go for either Chateau Trotanoy which is one of my personal favorites, Chateau La Fleur-Petrus, l’Evangile, or even La Conseillant, which is a winemaking friend of mine.
00:09:11:00 – 00:09:38:00
I studied, is in Bordeaux, actually makes this wine, and she does a fantastic job here. For a Pomerol around $150 a bottle, I go for chateau Clinet. Do you have a favorite Pomerol personally? Let us know in the comments! That would be fantastic to hear from you. Now it’s time to rate Pomerol so we can compare it to other prestigious appellations around the world, which is what we do.
00:09:38:00 – 00:09:51:20
Every time I make one of those videos in our Bonner Private Wines appellation leaderboard.
00:09:51:22 – 00:10:14:22
Quality in Pomerol is essentially as high as it gets in the world of wine. As we said, it’s a tiny appellation and it’s expensive. So producers work really thoughtfully and have a great choice of wines or just plain good. It’s a ten out of ten. Prestige is also extremely high because if you know Pomerol, you know virtually all wines are good there.
00:10:14:22 – 00:10:37:00
If you have a bottle of Pomerol, it has to be something quite special. Although as we’ll talk more about in a second, the more affordable ones are not legends, of course, and everyone doesn’t always know the name Pomerol. Less perhaps than Saint-Emilion or Chateauneuf du Pape because it’s much smaller at production. It’s a nine out of ten.
00:10:37:02 – 00:11:05:15
Prices of Pomerol wines are very high. Some of the priciest in Bordeaux if you compare it to the top Burgundies, however, or even some icons of the Napa Valley like opus one I tasted recently $300 a bottle is not that high, so it’s another nine out of ten. Pomerol wines are quite scarce. Again, it’s a small appellation. It’s not as small as some Burgundy Grand Cru, so it is not hard to find a Pomerol wine.
00:11:05:15 – 00:11:32:09
And because they’re a little pricey, they do not just fly out of the shelves before you get a chance to swipe your credit card. It’s an eight out of ten. Finally, our quality price ratio, if you buy a relatively affordable Pomerol, is it going to be good? Well, it’s not easy to find an affordable Pomerol unlike Saint-Emilion or even Chateauneuf du Pape where you can find a $20 or $30 example.
00:11:32:11 – 00:11:56:05
Those are going to be very rare in Pomerol, probably not that great. At that price, you’d have to spend at least $50 to $70 for something that truly reflects the quality of palm roll, or even more like $100 for a really solid one. And that’s not such great value. So a mere seven out of ten here, and our grand score is 43 out of 50 points.
00:11:56:05 – 00:12:21:18
Yes, Pomerol takes the lead as the best world wine appellation in the world so far, topping Margaux and Barolo themselves. Wow, I can’t wait to get into Burgundy to see if we can find even better wine, gems, and better appellations. Thanks for watching again today. Make sure to watch more of our videos like and subscribe to help us produce more content like this.
00:12:21:18 – 00:12:47:12
It helps us immensely. It’s free, It’s only a little gesture, but make sure you do. Here’s my video. About 70 million. The one about Robert Parker, one about all the most expensive Bordeaux wines right here, and even some champagne content for you. Stay tuned and I will see you soon. In the wonderful world of wine. Cheers!
