Chateauneuf de Pape

Though
not nearly as widespread and important as the Bordeaux
blend, the Chateauneuf-du-Pape blend has become increasingly
important in recent years.

In
contrast to the Bordeaux blend which excels in temperate
climates that run cool to warm, the Chateauneuf-du-Pape
blend performs best in climates that run warm to hot.
Climate warming and an international trend favoring
full-bodied, spicy red wines have focused more attention on
sun-loving Southern Rhone varieties. In this article I
outline the history of the Chateauneuf-du-Pape blend and
describe the characteristics of its most important varietal
components.

The focal point of the
development of the Chateauneuf-du-Pape blend has been the
wine known today as Chateauneuf-du-Pape. The wine’s name
refers to a village in Southern Rhone Valley around which
the vineyards were planted. The town was the site of the
Avignon Popes’ summer chateau and vineyards in the 14th
century. Before the arrival of the Popes, the village was
known as Calernier, but the fame of the Popes’ chateau
encouraged inhabitants and non-inhabitants to call it
Chateauneuf-du-Pape, “the new castle of the Popes”. In the
18th century, the wines of the area were known simply as
vins d’Avignon (wines of the Avignon area), as the city of
Avignon lay just to the south. Much of this wine was
exported to Burgundy where it was used in blends to add
body, particularly to the wines of cool and wet vintages.
During the early 19th century, the wines were called
Chateauneuf-du-Pape-Calcernier. According to John
Livingstone-Learmonth, author of The Wines of the Rhone
(1992, Faber and Faber), contemporary descriptions of the
Chateauneuf-du-Pape wine of those years consistently
describe it as a much lighter wine than it is today. He
writes that Commandant Ducos, a member of a family who owned
the domaines of Condorcet and La Nerte, recommended the
varietal recipe of 20% Grenache and Cinsault, which gave the
blend “warmth, liqueur-like sweetness and mellowness”, 40%
Mourvedre, Syrah, Muscardin, and Vaccarese, which gave
“solidity, durability, and color, accompanied by a
straightforward, almost thirst-quenching flavor”, 30%
Picpoul and Counoise, which gave “vinosity, charm,
freshness, and accentuation of bouquet”, 10% Clairette and
Bourboulenc, which gave “finesse, fire and
sparkle”.

Phylloxera arrived in the
1870s. Severe wine shortages caused by the phylloxera
epidemic set the stage for rampant wine adulteration and
fraudulent labeling. Responding to this crisis in 1923,
Baron Le Roy of Chateau Fortia convinced producers to agree
on production regulations for the wine. The criterion for
vineyards producing Chateauneuf-du-Pape was terrain that was
so infertile and arid that thyme and lavender were able to
grow. A minimum alcoholic strength was stipulated – 12.5% –
which remains the highest minimum in France. Producers had
to perform a triage in their vineyards, directing the best
grapes towards Chateauneuf-du-Pape production. The
production of Chateauneuf-du-Pape Rose was forbidden. A
maximum of 35 hectoliters per hectare was specified as a
base yield. These regulations became the model on which the
national French AOC regulations were based.

Originally in 1923 there
were ten varieties – three more were added in 1936. Of the
thirteen varieties allowed, the red Chateauneuf-du-Papes are
Grenache Noir, Syrah, Mourvedre, Picpoul Noir, Terret Noir,
Counoise, Muscardin, Vaccarese, Picardin, Cinsault, and the
whites are Clairette, Roussanne, and Bourboulenc.The high
number of allowed varieties compared to other AOCs suggests
that pre-phylloxera Chateauneuf-du-Pape was a blend of many
varieties. After the phylloxera, Grenache dominated the
blend because it easily produced the high alcohol wines that
merchants wanted. In his book, Livingstone-Learmonth
mentions that during the 1920s, Paul Avril of Clos des Papes
sold his Grenache for twice the price of his Syrah-Mourvedre
blend. Grenache remained dominant throughout the 20th
Century. In 1989, Livingston-Learmonth conducted a tasting
of vintages spanning three decades. He estimated the average
percentage of Grenache in the various blends of the various
producers to be 80%. In 1991, a survey conducted by the
Growers’ Federation showed that 79.5% of growers’ vineyards
were dedicated to Grenache. More recently, Robert M. Parker,
Jr. in his Wines of the Rhone Valley (1997, Simon &
Schuster) estimated that the typical Chateauneuf-du-Pape
blend consisted of 65% to 70% Grenache, 10% to 15% Mourvedre
and Syrah, and small percentages of the remaining
varieties.

The origin of the Grenache
vine variety was probably in the Province of Aragon in
Spain. The Spaniards use the word Garnacha. In the 1400s,
the Spaniards brought the variety to Sardinia where it came
to be known as Cannonao. During the last half of the 17th
Century, plantings spread to Navarre and Rioja, then to the
Roussillon area of France, and eventually to the Southern
Rhone Valley. The best expression of Grenache in Spain has
been at Priorato, but the blending in of international grape
varieties such as Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot and Syrah makes
it difficult to clearly identify Grenache in the final
wines. Grenache is also widely planted in hot dry areas in
Australia and California where it is often used as a filler
grape for jug wines or as a base for fortified
wines.

Grenache’s resistance to
heat, drought, wind, and oidium has made it an excellent
candidate for warm, dry and windy climates. Grenache wines
have a light ruby-red color which rapidly evolves into
mahogany with age. Red fruit aromas, usually cherry,
dominate the bouquet, which, at normal yields and unadorned
by winemaking flourishes, is very simple in character.
Alcohol percentage is normally high. A lack of both tannin
and acidity makes the wine vulnerable to oxidation. Despite
these limitations, Chateauneuf-du-Pape growers in the early
1900s planted more and more Grenache. It was their best cash
crop. Nowadays, with quality Chateauneuf-du-Pape able to
sell at good prices, the better producers limit yields below
the maximum and do such a good job in the cellar that
Grenache-dominant wines can show quite a bit of complexity.
Exceptional producers such as Chateau Rayas, Chapoutier, Les
Cailloux, and Henri Bonneau use as much as 80% to 100%
Grenache in their blends.

During the 1960s, France’s
Ministry of Agriculture advocated planting enough Cinsault
to account for 10% of the blend. With its relatively pale
color, low acidity, high pH, and its tendency to be
over-productive, quality producers in later years slowly
replaced their Cinsault vines with others. Certain wine
producers value obscure members of the Chateauneuf wine
blend family. The late Baron Le Roy of Chateau Fortia
advocated Muscardin in place of Cinsault. He felt it gave
good aromas and freshness to the wine. However, its
vegetation sprawls over the ground complicating work in the
vineyard, and its wines have a low alcohol degree. Baron Le
Roy was also a strong proponent of Counoise. Its wines give
peppary smells and a good acidity. Chateau de Beaucastel
puts 5% of Counoise in their blend, an unusually high
percentage for the zone. Picpoul Noir, Terret Noir, and
Vaccarese add little to the blend. Their use is
negligible.

While Syrah originated in
the Northern Rhone Valley, its arrival in the Southern Rhone
in any great quantity is more recent. The earliest mention
of its use in the Chateauneuf-du-Pape was at Domaine de
Condorcet in 1878. During the 1970s, Syrah began replacing
Cinsault in the vineyards. It’s darker wine color, smoky and
spicy nose, and thick tannins, though, can easily mask
Grenache character. Australia has long had extensive
plantings of Syrah. In fact, these have been the most
extensive in the world. Aussie fascination with Cabernet
Sauvignon during the 1970s and early 1980s encouraged farms
to uproot Syrah vines. In the mid-1980s, Robert M. Parker,
Jr. published his The Wines of the Rhone Valley and
Provence.The popularity of this book among wine collectors
and members of the trade brought the Northern Rhone Syrahs
and Chateauneuf-du-Papes to the attention of wine
connoisseurs and wine producers around the world. This
factor, along with the rise of Aussie identity in the 1990s,
helped Australians identify Syrah, or “Shiraz” as they
called it, as something valuable and something very
Australian. California’s Rhone Ranger movement in the 1990s
expanded the use of Southern Rhone varieties, particularly
Syrah. In the late 1990s, interest in Syrah spread to
Washington State. There are also substantial plantings in
Argentina and South Africa. Although Italians have yet to
master Syrah as a varietal wine, the vine is being widely
planted throughout Tuscany for use as a blender with
Sangiovese. Plantings have also expanded outside the Rhone
in France, particularly in the Languedoc. Though more
resistant to fungus disease than Grenache, Syrah is less
tolerant of heat and drought. Because it is harvested
earlier that Grenache, ambient temperatures during the
harvest period are higher. Syrah grapes can ripen too
quickly at such temperatures. If brought in overripe, the
wines lack fruit aroma and acidity.

The last
Chateauneuf-du-Pape grape with potential is Mourvedre. In
the 1980s, Mourvedre became fashionable in the
Chateauneuf-du-Pape area. Known chiefly as Monastrell in
Spain, it too has a Spanish origin, probably in the Valencia
region. Though it is widely planted in east-central Spain,
very few interesting Mourvedre varietal wines are made
there. As is the case with Grenache, the best example of
Mourvedre is found in France, just inland from the seaside
fishing village of Bandol on the Cote d’Azur. Mourvedre is
the principle grape variety in Bandol AOC red wines. The
vine is one of latest ripening on the planet. It is
difficult to ripen dependably unless it is grown within a
few miles of a large body of warm water such as the
Mediterranean Sea. The wines sport a moderately intense
red-brown color, a red-berried and gamy nose, and strong
tannins in the mouth. There are also substantial plantings
in Australia where the wine has been used for blending.
California has some pre-prohibition vines in Contra Costa
County, just west of San Francisco. In California and
Australia, Mourvedre has also been called Mataro. In both
these countries, a handful of producers making interesting
varietal Mourvedre – Cline Cellars, for example, from
California and Hewitson from South Australia. Going back to
Chateauneuf-du-Pape, Chateau La Nerthe and Chateau de
Beaucastel champion the variety. Mourvedre pairs seamlessly
with Grenache. It subtly adds color, aroma and tactile
structure to Grenache without masking it. Grenache and
Mourvedre marry well in blends.

New World wine industries
have tended to place the much more popular Bordeaux blend
varieties in climates that have assured grape ripeness.
Seeking regular ripening, they often erred on the side of
selecting overly warm sites. Climate warming has lately been
pushing these sites even farther away from being marginal
with respect to their physiologic maturation of the grapes.
As a result, the New World Bordeaux blends are increasingly
too overripe in the nose and too alcoholic in the mouth. The
trend in European viticulture of the 1990s was to plant red
Bordeaux vine varieties in regions warmer than Bordeaux,
ones that resulted in less vintage variation in the wines.
France’s Languedoc-Roussillon region and Italy’s Tuscan
Coast are examples of this trend. Producers in these regions
are coming out with similar overripe versions of red
Bordeaux. Such sites are, in general, better suited for the
vine varieties in the Chateauneuf-du-Pape blend. Interest in
the Chateauneuf-du-Pape blend in these New and Old World
areas will likely increase in the future &endash; that is,
unless another Ice Age heads our way.