1998 Chateau Pape Clement

Last night, we did a little happy dance, having finished the last of the bottom cinching of our 10 rows of netting. We celebrated by having this 1998 Chateau Pape Clement with a steak that my husband put on the grill and slowly smoked it with hickory chips, a technique that he has honed to perfection. Yes, Bordeaux and steak is a very good pairing.
The wine was very dark purple in color. When I held the glass to the light, there was no color change tinge on the perimeter of the wine, indicating that for a 19 year old wine, very little oxidation had taken place. The bouquet was a deliciously fruity one and the flavors to me were of black currants, black raspberries, a little cedar and great acidity. The tannins were very well integrated and was a joy to drink with our meal.
I looked on the Internet for more information about Chateau Pape Clement and found The Wine Cellar Insider where I learned how they make their wine:
To produce the red wine of Chateau Pape Clement, the fruit is whole berry fermented. The grapes are manually destemmed. Vinification takes place in large, temperature controlled wood vats that range in size, corresponding to the size of the parcels. The large, oak tanks vary in size from 50 hectoliters to 150 hectoliters. There is a manual punching down of the cap. The red wine is run off directly into 100% new, French oak barrels via gravity flow, without any pumping over. Malolactic fermentation takes place in barrel. The red wine of Pape Clement is aged in 100% new, French oak barrels for an average of 18 to 20 months before bottling.¹
What caught my eye was the sentence "the grapes are manually destemmed"! I need to run this by my husband for next year when we hope to get a small harvest of Cabernet Sauvignon and Cabernet Franc.
Reference:
1. The Wine Cellar Insider