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Chateau Clos de la Tour
By
Published: Jan 01, 2004
Category:
Food and Wine
Butler’s mother often says, "It’s better to live in the worst house in the best neighborhood than the best house in the second-best neighborhood."
Butler’s mother knows — about a lot more than real estate.
Wine, for example. French wine, in specific. As you know, wine is sacred to the French, and so they are as strict as prison wardens about its classifications. In 1855, experts graded the wines of Bordeaux; they decreed that only four vineyards produced top-quality "First Growth" wines. A century and a half later, there are five — in 1973, Chateaux Mouton-Rothschild was raised from a Second Growth to a First Growth.
First Growths cost the moon. Maybe they are worth it — Butler has trouble enjoying a bottle that costs as much as his monthly mortgage payment. (You’re buying? Great! Be right over!) But here’s where Mother’s lovely truth about real estate comes into play. Many vineyards own more land than just the acreage that produces their first wines — and it’s often no more than a chip shot away.
Consider a Bordeaux called Pichon Baron. It’s grown in a vineyard that adjoins Château Latour, one of the original "First Growths." In the 1990s, this label began to be managed by a winemaking legend, Jean-Michel Cazes. Its cost: a fraction of Latour. Its taste: If you’re not a wine nut, you’d say it’s a close relative of Latour. That is, you drink it with great pleasure. So let’s hear it for second wines of great vineyards.
Or consider the wine Butler has just discovered: Chateau Clos de la Tour. Let’s do the geneology. The second label of Chateau Latour is Les Forts de Latour. Butler has had some; it’s a beaut. Latour also makes a third wine: Pauillac. It too is not shabby.
What is the relationship between Clos de la Tour and Latour? As far as Butler can tell — none. Just clever merchandising. The label obscures its exact origins in Bordeaux. But, hey, it got Butler to buy a bottle of the 2001 at the astounding price of $10.
Butler is not of the view that wines are "chewy" or have the taste of "tobacco." What he looks for a layers — and harmony of those layers. Not for Butler the big, beefy wines that Robert Parker adores. Give Butler a round, soft wine that has a mellow finish — a wine that produces magic in the mouth and magic in the head — and he feels well rewarded. On that basis, this wine delivers. Just give it 10-15 minutes to "open" in the glass.
Clos de la Tour — from the great Bordeaux vintage of 2000 — is a bargain on the web: $ 10.37 a bottle, three bottles for $29.55, six bottles for $55.98, a 12 bottle case for $105.72. At these prices, you can serve "la Tour" as your everyday wine. And if you speak quickly as you pour, your guests will never know you’re not serving them the higher-priced, higher-prized wine.
To order Clos de la Tour online, click here.
