Château Clarke 2019

Tasting characteristics and advice for Château Clarke 2019

Tasting

Color
The color reveals a deep purple hue with distinctive ruby highlights, reflecting the grapes’ natural concentration and the wine’s youth.

Nose
The bouquet opens with expressive aromas of ripe black fruits, notably blackcurrant and blueberry, accompanied by notes of licorice and sour cherry. Spicy nuances of black pepper and violet enhance the aromatic complexity. Aging in French oak barrels brings subtly integrated touches of cocoa, coffee and toasted wood, along with notes of vanilla and sweet spices.

Palate
The attack is supple and generous, with no harsh tannins. The palate displays fine breadth and an elegant structure, supported by velvety, ripe tannins. A persistent aromatic freshness, characteristic of the clay-limestone terroir, lends lift that harmoniously balances the fruit’s richness. The finish lingers with intensity: black-fruit notes remain predominant, while spicy and oaky elements assert themselves retro-nasally.

Food and wine pairings

Château Clarke 2019 is an ideal match for grilled or roasted red meats such as entrecôte à la bordelaise, veal chops with thyme or roast beef. It also pairs beautifully with duck breast with porcini mushrooms, duck confit or herb-roasted leg of lamb. Aged hard cheeses such as Comté or Cantal also make excellent pairings.

Serving and cellaring

This wine is best enjoyed at a serving temperature between 16 and 18°C. Decanting for one to two hours will aerate the wine and help its aromatic complexity fully unfold. Château Clarke 2019 can be enjoyed now, but it will continue to evolve until around 2032, during which time it will express its finest balance between freshness and developed complexity.

A powerful, fresh wine from Listrac

The estate

Founded in 1973, Château Clarke embodies in Bordeaux the revival of a Listrac-Médoc cru driven by Baron Edmond de Rothschild. Today, the estate belongs to Ariane de Rothschild via Edmond de Rothschild Heritage, which brings together 11 estates worldwide. The property stands alongside Château Malmaison and Château Odilon in Haut-Médoc. Its singularity lies in continuous modernization, including a new winery inaugurated in 2023 and a parcel restructuring guided by climate audits.

The vineyard

Château Clarke’s vineyard stands out for its terroir, atypical for the Médoc, composed mainly of clay-limestone soils with a significant proportion of blue and grey clay over a limestone subsoil. This geological configuration, closer to that of the Right Bank, gives the wines remarkable freshness thanks to the soils’ water-buffering properties. These Listrac vines average 30 years of age.

The vintage

The 2019 vintage in Bordeaux benefited from exceptionally favorable climatic conditions. The year delivered a remarkable balance, enabling optimal ripening of the grapes, with particularly appealing generosity and balance in the berries. This vintage was recognized as one of the region’s most successful, receiving the highest rating for the overall quality of production conditions.

Winemaking and aging

The Château Clarke 2019 harvest was carried out by hand in small crates. The grapes underwent meticulous sorting on vibrating tables before vinification. Vinification was conducted plot by plot in a combination of wooden vats and temperature-controlled stainless-steel tanks, notably thanks to the new gravity-flow vat room. Malolactic fermentation took place directly in French oak barrels. Aging then continued for 15 to 18 months in barrels, with 60% to 80% new oak depending on the plots, allowing for harmonious integration of the oaky components.

Grape varieties

Merlot (70%)
Cabernet sauvignon (30%)