In this series, Mark Pardoe MW provides insight into how Bordeaux’s key communes fared in 2020. Here, our Wine Director looks at Sauternes and Barsac, based on a conversation with Olivier Castéja of Ch. Doisy-Védrines. At a glance: Sauternes and Barsac in 2020 Hectares under vine: 2,217 Average yield: 12hl/ha in 2020 (14hl/ha in ’19); […]

Bérénice Lurton inherited Ch. Climens, a Sauternes powerhouse, from her father in 1992. We speak to her about her dry white Bordeaux, Asphodèle.   The fields of Homer’s underworld are strewn with asphodels, whose delicate white petals have long been associated with death.   Unlikely associations, then, for Ch. Climens’ latest wine, a dry white Bordeaux with only two vintages behind it. Asphodèle is born of Bérénice Lurton’s collaboration with Sancerre winemaker Pascal Jolivet. Its association with death, she explains, is no accident.   […]

Sauternes and the other sweet wines of Bordeaux are all too often overlooked, says Clara Bouffard. Having grown up in the region, she’d like that to change. I grew up in the Bordeaux region. At home, local white and sweet wines were every bit as common as reds. Only when I started travelling did I […]

Last month,  in our Pickering Cellar saw one of the most scintillating tastings ever held in our premises. Proprietor of Château Climens Bérénice Lurton came over from Bordeaux and talked through a dazzling array of 12 vintages of her extraordinary Barsac wine, ranging from 2008 back to 1964. In all the themed tastings I have […]