"cwdjrxyz" > wrote:

> From your note above and several other notes I have read on
> recent vintages of Pape-Clement, this wine has greatly improved
> from what it was in the 1970s. My notes from that era were not
> very flattering. They also had a white in the 70s that was
> decent, but not outstanding, in the one vintage that I tasted.
> If I were buying Bordeaux today, it might be worth checking
> Pape-Clement again. In the 70s I soon concluded that money spent
> for Pape-Clement would buy a wine much more to my taste
> elsewhere.

The improvement - stunning and fast - dates from vintage 1986
upwords. Pape Clément was acquired in 1937 by Paul Montagne. 1939
saw the entire property more or less fully destructed by a severe
hailstorm. Paul's son Léo took over, but apparently never really
cared. Léo's son-in-law Bernard Magrez was put in charge sometime
in the mid-1980ies.

So you can buy "blind" almost anything from 1986 or younger,
as you should avoid just about anything from 1985 or older.

I have been on a press trip to Pape Clément in October 1989. Denis
Dubourdieu, then consultant oenologist, let us taste 1986/7/8
sinde by side, plus a tank sample of one of the merlots from 1989.
The wines were quite impressive, with 1987 a much lighter style,
of course.

Funnily, the tasting in the chai was done from Riedel glasses,
while the wines for lunch at the chateau - all from the pre-Magrez
era - were served in crappy glasses the caterer had brought with
him. (To be honsest, Bordeaux caterers today do care for better
stemware, but at that time ...).

But I remember that everyone had standing, besides the small
glasses for the wines, a water bowl that happened to be the large
Riedel Sommelier Bordeaux Grand Cru stem (4400/00). With the last
red, Pape Clément 1961, I had it poured into this glass, much to
the distress of the server - and to an almost collapsing maitre d'
in the background.

We were four tables. From every table one non-French journalist
was asked about his opinion about the '61. As fate would have it,
from my table they asked me. Since the wine was rather tired and
slightly oxidized - nowhere, where a decent 1961 claret should be
- I tried to be polite and deliberated about how really great reds
converge when getting older, so that the characters of an almost
30 year old claret and an equally old Barolo show similarities.

I guess what I said was not what they wanted to hear ... ;-(

M.