Clos l'Église Côtes de Castillon 2005

Clos l'Église (Côtes de Castillon) Bordeaux 2005

Friday night, quiet dinner at home, Linda grilled some steaks and vegetables and I pulled from the cellar this middle-aged vintage Bordeaux for simple, pleasant drinking accompaniment from this 'lesser' appellation.

Château Clos L’Eglise is a 40-acre estate in St-Magne de Castillon in the appellation of Côtes de Castillon, lying at the easternmost edge of Bordeaux's Right Bank, adjacent to the larger and more famous St.-Émilion. 

Côtes de Castillon is a lesser appellation, also known as one of the 'satellite' appellations. The main town of Castillon-la-Bataille lies on the Right Bank of the Dordogne River which flows into and meets the Gironde river above the city of Bordeaux to form the Gironde Estuary that flows westward to the Atlantic. 

A smaller appellation consisting of  2,900 hectares (7,500 acres). most of the domains are less than 10 hectares (25 acres), never-the-less, it produces 22 millions bottles of Merlot and Cabernet Franc based red wines a year. 

Adjacent to Saint-Emilion, Côtes de Castillon has the similar terroir of plateau and hillslope, about 20% of the vineyards lying on the Dordogne’s silty plane and on a sandy area in the east of the appellation rising up to a limestone plateau which twists around a number of wooded hills and valleys, eventually reaching 117m at Saint-Philippe-d’Aiguilhe. The terroir is climatically a bit cooler than St Emilion, making the harvest a little later, and requiring good vineyard management.

The always dapper Count Stephan von Neipperg,
Château Canon-La-Gaffelière 
at UGCB 2016 Release Tour Chicago

Many St Emilion producers are expanding into the area. Stephan von Neipperg, well known owner of Château Canon-la-Gaffelière and La Mondotte in Saint-Emilion, was the first on the scene when he bought the 30ha Château d’Aiguilhe in 1998. He has been followed by other Saint-Emilion luminaries including Gérard Perse of premier grand cru classé Château Pavie, who acquired Sainte-Colombe, Clos l’Eglise and Clos des Lunelles (formerly Lapeyronie), and Gérard Bécot of Château Beau-Séjour Bécot, who launched Château Joanin Bécot with his daughter Juliette in 2001.

Red Côtes de Castillon wines are Merlot-based, offering complex and elegant flavors of red and black fruits. Wines from the best Côtes de Castillon producers can present excellent value (QPR - Quality Price Ratio) for fans of the St.-Émilion Grand Cru style. All wines from Côtes de Castillon may also carry the regional appellations of "Bordeaux" or "Bordeaux supérieur".

The Château Clos L’Eglise estate is owned by Gérard Perse, a French businessman and one-time bicycle champion. Perse sold two supermarket chains to finance his entry into the world of winemaking. He owns several Bordeaux estates, including Château Pavie and Pavie-Decesse. He stopped making wine under the Clos L’Eglise label after the 2008 vintage and since then used the estate’s grapes as part of the blend for his new Esprit de Pavie, a second wine for Pavie. Robert Parker cites that Clos L’Eglise was one of the least expensive wines produced by Gerard Perse.

Clos L’Eglise is a blend of 70% Merlot, 15% Cabernet Franc and 15% Cabernet Sauvignon. 

Back in May of 2019 I wrote about this wine,  "Dark garnet purple colored, medium bodied, dark berry fruits accented by notes of leather, tobacco, tea and hints of menthol, turning to nice fine grained tannins on the lingering finish."

RM 88 Points

Stephen Tanzer gave this wine 90-91 points. 

https://www.cellartracker.com/wine.asp?iWine=230916

https://unwindwine.blogspot.com/2019/05/clos-leglise-cotes-de-castillon-bordeaux.html

Large format bottles serve festive family and friends celebration dinner

Large format bottles serve festive family and friends celebration dinner

For the christening of our new grandson, namesake Richie, following the christening of our newest granddaughter, Marleigh, a few weeks ago, we hosted a celebration dinner for over twenty family and friends (plus a half dozen kids) at home after church.

To accompany Linda's homemade lasagna, we opened two large format bottles of Merlot, a magnum from the new world Napa Valley, California, and a double magnum from the old world, Bordeaux, Southern France. From the 1996 vintage, we opened a Liparita Howell Mountain Merlot in magnum, and a Chateau Pitray Côtes de Castillon Bordeaux in double magnum.

Horizontal collection of 1981 vintage large format bottles -
six liter Imperials and nine liter Salmanazar

Indeed our collection of large format bottles (see my Winesite page explaining wine bottle sizes) commemorating the birth-years of our children was the basis of our cellar being featured in the Collecting column of Wine Spectator back in June 2001.

For each of the kids birth-years we held or hold large format bottles of signature wines for their year of birth. These represent horizontal selections for their birth-year (multiple bottles from the same vintage is known as a horizontal), and vertical collections (multiple vintages of the same label) across the four kids' birth-years.

Needless to say, we haven't yet collected any birth-year bottles for the two youngsters born in 2013, but we're following the vintage and harvest reports carefully to determine what to acquire to commemorate this year. And we're just now acquiring a horizontal collection to commemorate our first grandchild, Lucy's birth-year 2010. Already two of our collection holdings have received 100 points ratings for their 2010 release, Chateau Pontet Canet, Pauillac Bordeaux, and Dominus, Napa Valley Red Wine, ageworthy collectables, indeed.

Those that know us well, know about our serving our daughter Erin's birth-year vintage large format bottles at her wedding (shown above), and the same for son Ryan at his wedding. And we're still holding large format bottles for sons Sean and Alec's birth-years.




Today's selection:

Liparita Napa Valley Howell Mountain Merlot 1996

We discovered this wine and tasted it from the barrel at the custom crush facility in Oakville with winemaker Gove Celia during our Napa Wine Experience back in 1998. From our cellar in magnum. Notes consistent with earlier tasting.

Dark color - medium-full bodied - black cherry, black berry fruits still holding for this seventeen year old - perhaps aided by larger format magnum, tones of cedar, spicy oak, subtle leather and earth - moderate smooth well integrated tannins on a lingering finish. $66 at Dean & Deluca in Napa (upon release)

RM 89 points.

http://www.cellartracker.com/wine.asp?iWine=219362  


Château Pitray Côtes de Castillon Bordeaux 1996

Today the Chateau, located about thirty miles east of the town of St Emilion, is a B&B, bed and breakfast, as well as a wine estate. The property has a total about 36 hectares (65 plus acres) in vines with an average age of 29 years. The varietals of grapes consist of Merlot (75%), Cabernet and Cabernet Franc (25%). The estate produces an average of 240.000 bottles a year.

The Pitray estate has been in the same family for 600 years. As early as 1969, Louis de Pitray, began modernising the estate and established long-standing commercial relationships with the United Kingdom and the United States.  Jean de Boigne, his grandson son has been in charge of selling Pitray wines since 2003, as its quality is increasingly recognized around the world.


Medium-light bodied, dark garnet colored, slightly tart astringent black cherry gives way to tones of earth, tar and leather with hints of spicy black licorice and woody-cedar, turning to tart fruit layer lingering on a tight tannin backbone finish.

RM 86 points

https://www.cellartracker.com/wine.asp?iWine=28224

http://www.chateau-pitray.com/