Cos d'Estournel launches first white wine
October 3, 2007
Oliver Styles

One of Bordeaux's top red wine chateaux, Cos d'Estournel, has released its first ever white wine.

The chateau, a second growth in the Medoc appellation of St-Estephe, released its white wine, called Cos d'Estournel blanc, this week.

The wine, a 2005 vintage currently selling through UK merchant Farr Vintners for £100 a bottle, is a Bordeaux white blend of Semillon and Sauvignon. Despite the chateau's location in the south of the St Estephe appellation, next to Pauillac, the vineyards for Cos blanc are located at the northernmost tip of the Medoc.

The bottle is almost identical to that of the grand vin, with the label, bottle and foil in green. Each bottle comes in an individual box.

Although the price tag may seem excessive, Farr's are plugging the fact that Laville Haut Brion, a similar level white wine from Graves chateau La Mission Haut Brion, is worth 'considerably more' at £130 a bottle.

Have your say... To post your comment on this story, email us at news@decanter.com, making sure the relevant headline is in the subject field ...Laville has been making world renowned wine for how long? For the price I'd rather have 3 bottles of Domaine de Chevalier or half a case of Carbonnieux. Is there no end to their greed? Adrian Latimer, Paris, France The gall of Mr. Prats never ceases to amaze me. A. Skroback, New York, USA For all the noises made about terroir by the Bordeaux producers, Farr comparing the white from the northern Medoc to the white of Laville Haut-Brion is heresy. I wonder what the other proprietors are thinking. Who said garage wines were dead. Here is a new one. Juan Dangond, Miami, USA Oh dear, being accused of heresy is a bit strong. If anyone would like to actually read what we wrote on our web site, all we said was that Robert Parker scored Cos d'Estournel Blanc 2005 92 points and Laville Haut Brion Blanc 2005 92+ . Now, I have not tasted either wine since they were bottled so cannot comment personally on their quality - only on their rarity values. I would, of course, expect Laville Haut Brion to be the greater wine. However Robert Parker is the world's most powerful critic and he clearly rates them as being of similar quality. Parker has tasted the wines, I doubt that Mr Dangond has. I wonder what he thinks of the release price of Ygrec 2005 today? Stephen Browett, Farr Vintners, London, UK With all due respect to Farr and to Mr. Browett, the criticism stands, though it can be understood in the context of a merchant who needs to hock an overpriced wine. Otherwise, why choose to compare it to the expensive Laville HB, when you could also have compared it to the far less expensive 2005 Carbonnieux Blanc or 2005 De Fieuzal Blanc, which both outscored it at 93 points, or even the 2005 Reignac Blanc, which got 91 points? A. Skroback, New York, USA Good to see such open-minded debate about a wine such as this. White Bordeaux has the potential to be almost as enticing a category as white Burgundy. If someone like Dugat-Py had introduced a white Chambertin (cue correspondence saying it could only be called Bourgogne Blanc...) in similarly tiny quantities, no doubt it could have commanded a similarly high price. Anyone prepared to read between the lines on the Farr website will see that Steven Browett and Co have as much interest in promoting this wine as in bigging up overhyped garage wines. If a wine is good, they'll add their endorsements to those from the American critics. If they think it's pants, but there's still some money to be made in listing it, then they're not averse to giving it a punt. Does that make them charlatans? Perhaps, but how many people have made money from being wine purists? The Farr team has plenty of extremely well-informed opinion of its own. However, the company makes a serious proportion of its money from selling wines to people who listen to other people's opinions. Simon Woods Maybe Mr Browett could also shed some light on how this wine can have the Cos d'Estournel moniker, yet make this new white wine from grapes grown at a site not contiguous with the Chateau's red vineyards? A liberal extension of their esteemed 2nd Growth Appellation? Or do the bourgeois Bordelais now revere the winemaker more than the vineyards? Rod Easthope, New Zealand It comes indeed as a complete surprise that the property is allowed to use the "Cos d' Estournel" name for wine that hasn't been grown on a classified vineyard site. Maybe French authorities should re-consider the way the names of classified Châteaux can be used. The case of Cos d'Estournel blanc is clearly different from, e.g., Château Fieuzal, Château Pape Clément and Château Smith Haut Lafitte, whose whites aren't officially acknowledged as classified growths: But these châteaux obtain their whites from more or less the same sites than their classified reds. Dr. Ulrich Sautter, Redaktion Wein Gourmet, Hamburg, Germany With regard to the grapes being grown away from the estate, being a white wine it will only be an AOC Bordeaux, and not an AOC St. Estephe, and therefore the grapes could come from anywhere in Bordeaux. Only Entre-de-Mer, Graves, and Pessac-Leognan are dry white AOC's. Richard Fadeley, Columbia, SC, USA

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