All the grapes of a vine are required to serve a single glass of one of the world's most renowned sweet wines, the iconic Château d'Yquem. This white wine from Sauternes (Bordeaux) was already enjoyed by kings and tsars, and also by characters such as Napoleon Bonaparte, Marcel Proust or Joseph Stalin. Thomas Jefferson documented that, after sampling a Château d'Yquem, President George Washington immediately ordered 30 dozen bottles.
A single bottle costs around 620 euros, although in 2021 the collector Christian Vanneque, owner of a restaurant in Bali (Indonesia), came to pay up to 84,700 euros at auction for a bottle of the 1811 vintage. This Premier Cru Supérieur Classé of the Sauternes Contrôlée appellation already has 400 years of experience. From the winery they explain that "the history of Château d'Yquem is like a novel, an epic saga full of events and colorful personalities that spans more than four centuries."
The distributor Primeras Marcas has offered in Barcelona a memorable vertical tasting of this liquid jewel belonging, since the end of the 20th century, to the great luxury group Louis Vuitton Moët Hennessy. Bottles from the 1983 (extraordinary, with great acidity), 1990, 2005, 2013, 2015 (very interesting) and 2020 (which went on the market on March 23) vintages have been tasted.
They are wines that are offered at prices of up to 1,600 euros. It has also been possible to taste the 2016 vintage of its wine Y (pronounced ee-grek in French). The climate has not always allowed them to produce Château d'Yquem. It was not produced in the 1910, 1915, 1930, 1951, 1952, 1964, 1972, 1974, 1992, and 2012 vintages.
The pleasure of tasting Yquem is difficult to describe, as is recognized from the winery itself. And it is that it offers a wide variety of well-balanced flavors that generate even more harmonies and complexities over time. It is stated from Château d'Yquem that the impression that remains is reminiscent of a quote by Frédéric Dard: "the silence that follows a piece by Mozart, in which the listener is impregnated with the music".
This reflects the fact that it stays on the palate for a remarkable amount of time. To describe Yquem's tremendously long aftertaste, they use the French expression “il fait la queue du paon” (it stretches out like a peacock's tail). The director of First Brands, Philippe Eberlé, affirms that "Yquem is the quintessence of Sauternes wines: a magnificent balance between complexity and acidity that offers us absolutely delicious wines".
Yquem exhibits notes ranging from apricot (dried apricot), quince, date, honey or almond to fig, rose, lychee, bitter orange or mandarin peel, vanilla, saffron or coffee beans toasted. The young Yquem vintages are best enjoyed, according to the winery, served at 9°C, while it is preferable to serve the older ones at a temperature of 12°C. In the best vintages it has an aging potential of more than a century.
The property is extensive. It is located on a hill where the castle that gives it its name also stands. They have 104 hectares planted with vineyards on clay-sandy soils with limestone, with 80% sémillon and sauvignon blanc in the remaining 20%. During the Middle Ages the property belonged to the King of England, who was also the Duke of Aquitaine at the time. In 1453, thanks to Charles VII, the south-west of France returned to the domain of the French crown.
A century and a half later, in 1593, a scion of a local noble family, Jacques Sauvage, received the feudal estate of Yquem. The archives of the Gironde department, as well as those of the castle, show that special wine-growing practices and late harvests already existed at this time. A few years later, the Sauvage family built the château and patiently set about planting the current vineyard, plot by plot. The family became full owners of Yquem in 1711, during the reign of Louis XIV (by which time they had already received noble status).
In 1785, Françoise Joséphine de Sauvage d'Yquem married Count Louis Amédée de Lur-Saluces. Three years later, in 1788, the count died after a riding accident. His young widow thus became head of the family and displayed extraordinary acumen in the management of property. The wine was already highly appreciated by famous connoisseurs of the time.
A staunch opponent of the excesses of the French Revolution and imprisoned twice, Françoise Joséphine managed to keep the family property and make Yquem prosper. She built a new winery in 1826 with her butler Garos de ella, a bold move at the time, transforming the estate into a true business and developing her international reputation.
They say that, in the autumn of 1847, the Marquis de Lur-Saluces was invited by the Tsar of Russia to a hunting party and before leaving he gave instructions not to collect anything in his absence. The Russian winter kept the hunting party going on for several weeks. When the marquis was able to return to his property, he was surprised to find that his entire vineyard had been affected by what is known as noble rot, caused by a pathogenic fungus (Botrytis cinerea) that had dehydrated his grapes. When pressed, the sweet elixir of Château d'Yquem was obtained.
The technical director of the winery, Lorenzo Pasquini, affirms that "people know little and little about the magic behind noble rot: humidity is required to develop the fungus and wind to dry it." A unique set of climatic and geological conditions thus combine to form a rare balance. All this takes the grapes "to another level of complexity, with a great capacity to travel in time." In addition to sugar and acidity, Pasquini highlights the saline and bitter touches.
Yquem went through a long period of prosperity in the second half of the 19th century. In 1859, Grand Duke Constantine, brother of Tsar Alexander I of Russia, spent 20,000 francs on a 900-litre barrel of Yquem, that is, almost four times the prevailing price at the time. Japan, which opened to foreign trade during the Meiji dynasty, also discovered the delights of Yquem. There is evidence that sweet wines were produced in the Sauternes area at the end of the 17th century, but it is not clear whether these wines were botrytised.
It is believed that the unattractiveness of a wine produced from rotten grapes could have led producers to hide its origin. Everything changed from the second half of the 18th century, when the production of botrytised sweet wine in Tokaj (Hungary) began to be widely accepted on the market. There was then open talk of noble rot in the Sauternes vineyard, whose reputation soon rose to rival that of Tokaj's sweet wines.
Its production is only between 9 and 10 hectoliters per hectare. Everything at Château d'Yquem revolves around meticulous work, both in the vineyard and in the cellar. At harvest time, a team of up to 150 people works for between 6 and 8 weeks, since manual harvesting is done grain by grain. Only the overripe berries are harvested, repeating this process up to 11 times on a single vine. Fermentation lasts between four and six weeks, and aging lasts for more than two years in new French oak barrels.
