Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
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Wine Spectator
Gentle aromas of acacia, white peach, lemon curd and wet stone, followed by creamy mango on the palate. It’s medium-to full-bodied with crisp acidity. Flavorful with smooth, generous layers of fruit. Drink or hold.
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Jeb Dunnuck
Beautiful honeyed lemon, white peach, white flowers, and chalky minerality emerge from the 2018 Clementin De Pape Clement Blanc. and it's medium-bodied, with a pure, balanced, elegant texture and terrific length on the finish. It's not a blockbuster, but it offers terrific complexity and loads of up-front charm and class.
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Vinous
The 2018 Clémentin de Pape Clément, bottled June 2019, has just pulled away from the Le Prélat since I tasted them both 12 months ago, offering a little more delineation, with some lovely honeysuckle scents coming through. The palate is well balanced and slightly honeyed, delivering fine acidity and mango and white peach notes laced with vanilla toward the finish. Difficult to resist drinking now, though it should age well over several years.
Sometimes light and crisp, other times rich and creamy, Bordeaux White Blends typically consist of Sauvignon Blanc and Semillon. Often, a small amount of Muscadelle or Sauvignon Gris is included for added intrigue. Popularized in Bordeaux, the blend is often mimicked throughout the New World. Somm Secret—Sauternes and Barsac are usually reserved for dessert, but they can be served before, during or after a meal. Try these sweet wines as an aperitif with jamón ibérico, oysters with a spicy mignonette or during dinner alongside hearty Alsatian sausage.
Famous for both its red and white wines, Graves is a large region, extending 30 miles southeast of the city of Bordeaux, along the left bank of the Garonne River. Red wine producing vineyards cover well over three times as much area as the whites. In the late 1980s, the French created the separate appellation of Pessac-Léognan within the northern confines of Graves. It includes all of its most famous properties, and the southern suburbs of the city Bordeaux itself. In French "graves" is a term used to indicate gravelly soils.