FEATURES ARCHIVE

The sun was shining brightly, fiercely even, as we threaded our way slowly out of Libourne, driving via narrow lanes across the picturesque plateau of Pomerol and Saint-Emilion one fine July morning. Bordeaux was in the midst of a minor heat wave that would hit the high 30s Centigrade by lunchtime this day, but soon after parking the car on the crunchy gravel driveway of Château Cheval-Blanc, wine specialist Michael Ganne and I were being welcomed in the cool chai buildings by Technical Director, Pierre Olivier Clouet and Cellar Master, Thierry Garnaud.

We were here by kind invitation, in the midst of this beautifully manicured, world-famous estate, for a specific purpose – to observe the recorking of a range of bottles of Cheval Blanc’s most famous vintage – the legendary 1947. As we entered the room, the bottles, delivered to the Château some months before for this ultimate authentication, were standing in a line evoking military precision, silently awaiting the process. In order, an impériale, a jéroboam, a rare marie-jeanne (equal to 3 standard bottles), a magnum and two standard bottles – all containing that most famous vintage of Cheval-Blanc, one which has come to define perhaps one of the greatest vinous highlights of the 20th century.

The Cellar Master carefully drew the cork on each format. All were under the original closures but some corks relented more easily than others. Following the expert attention from Thierry’s corkscrew, the corks were successfully removed, each bearing the unmistakable and evocative Château branding of the legendary 1947 vintage.

Now came the good part. A measure was poured from each format into a tasting glass and tasted in turn, in silence, by the four of us present. To say we were all overwhelmed by this unique opportunity to taste what is possibly the world’s greatest wine from 5 different formats might be something of an understatement.

What was not understated was the incredible combination of concentration, fine aromas and flavors that each format displayed – all with very subtle and individual characteristics and nuances of their own, but all still with that incredible underlying consistency to be found in the finest wine.  Once each had been passed as ‘fit for purpose’, the small amount of ullage in each of the four largest formats was corrected by careful addition of wine from one of the standard 75cl bottles – one of these was perfect and utilized for the topping up – the other bottle, good enough, but a little tired and oxidized, was set aside and not used.

Following this came the recorking of the large formats – always a tense moment as the new and seemingly oversized new cork is driven firmly into the neck of the old and possibly fragile bottle – but all passed without problem. Then came the removal of the original labels and application of new ones showing the year of recorking. All that now remained to be done was the careful wrapping of each in a delicate Château  tissue wrapper and installing the bottles safely into new, branded wooden cases.

Through this carefully controlled procedure at the very estate where these bottles had been “born” over 6 decades ago,  it was possible to see how a wine of this undoubted quality and rarity could be given a new lease of life that could see the wine being consumed with great pleasure on its own Centenary in 2047 or beyond – something that would be unlikely without such controlled recorking – and thus giving a whole new generation of 21st-century wine lovers, the chance to “taste history” and decide for themselves the answer to that age-old wine question - “What is the Greatest Wine Ever Made?”

Château Cheval-Blanc 1947 is on my own short list.