| Region of Production: | Pauillac AOP |
| Winery Location: | Pauillac, neighboring Grand-Puy-Ducasse and Mouton-Rothschild. |
| Year Established: | 1725 |
| Classification: | Cinquième Grand Cru Classe, Médoc 1855 |
Vineyard Holdings
81 ha
- 62% Cabernet Sauvignon
- 32% Merlot
- 4% Cabernet Franc
- 2% Petit Verdot
Top Wines Produced & Inaugural Vintages
- Château Pontet-Canet (typically 90% of production)
- Les Hauts de Pontet-Canet: Inaugural vintage 1982 (as Château les Hauts de Pontet)
Average Total Production
- 300,000 bottles
Summary
Founded by Jean-François de Pontet in an old hamlet named Canet, the estate passed into the hands of a Danish-German négociant named Hermann Cruse in 1865. The Cruse family maintained the château for over a century and sold its wines to the French railways, establishing Pontet-Canet as a household name. But in 1973 the family’s négociant arm was embroiled in the Scandale à Bordeaux – French investigators brought charges against the company’s director, Lionel Cruse, asserting his complicity in buying and selling inferior wines as prestigious Bordeaux AOC products. The Cruse family was disgraced and forced to sell Pontet-Canet in the scandal’s wake. Guy Tesseron of Cognac fame bought the property in 1975 and installed Jean-Michel Comme as technical director in 1989. Together they have raised the estate from scandal and transformed the property into a biodynamic, natural-minded estate that often outperforms its 1855 ranking as a fifth growth.
Style & Vinification Techniques
Jean-Michel Comme, vineyard manager and winemaker for more than a quarter century, transformed Château Pontet-Canet into the first certified biodynamic classified growth in the Médoc. The low-trained, high-density vineyard (10,000 vines/ha) is unlike any other in Pauillac: Comme does not hedge, trim, leaf-thin, or green-harvest his vines. Fruit is hand-harvested and sorted by hand, before and after destemming. Ambient yeast fermentation occurs in both truncated cement vats and in large, temperature-controlled oak casks. Maceration lasts up to 3-4 weeks, with malolactic fermentation also occurring in vat and cask. After pressing, the wines are racked into three types of vessel for a 16- to 18-month élevage: new barriques (50%), 1-year-old barriques (15%), and egg-shaped cement “amphorae” (35%) of Comme’s own design. Collage is no longer practiced. The resulting style is incredibly ripe, extracted and brambly, but not overtly oaky.
Producer Website: Château Pontet-Canet