Château Pontet-Canet: Wines
It is not only in the vineyard that Château Pontet-Canet has seen dramatic change, but in the cellar too. The fruit is harvested into small-volume crates to reduce damage prior to fermentation, and then delivered into the upper level of the chai, above the vats, where it is sorted over two tables removing both non-grape material and the stems as well as any unsatisfactory fruit. This process is amenable to change of course, such as in the 2012 vintage when picking was expedited with the use of a third sorting line and an increased number of saisonniers being recruited to bring in the fruit, both signs of good planning by Jean-Michel Comme, who was well aware that harvest would be late and therefore perhaps a rather edgy affair.
This is all set to change though as new building work on the estate means that in future vintages the fruit will be brought into new cellars, constructed with a no-expense-spared mentality, which means instead of using modern construction techniques with a facade to match pre-existing buildings, they had been built using stone and mortar as the original buildings were during the 19th century.
One very notable feature is that these buildings have been built with no electrical supply, reflecting a fear that electricity can somehow harm the fruit. This was a belief held by Jean-Michel Comme, and seems to me quite extreme, in Nicolas Joly territory. Pictured below is Alfred Tesseron demonstrating the hand-destemming and sorting tables they use in these new electricity-free cellars.
