Clos St Jean Châteauneuf-du-Pape 'La Combe des Fous' 2020
A$215.00
Description
Clos Saint Jean has a history in Chateauneuf du Pape that can be dated all the way to the very start of the twentieth century. The estate was created by Edmund Tacussel in 1900. The Tacussel family also founded what later became Domaine Moulin Tacussel. Within a decade of its creation, Clos Saint Jean was ready to begin producing. bottling and selling their own wine, which they’ve been doing since 1910. However, Clos Saint Jean did not begin to earn fame until the 2003 vintage, which caused the famous wine critic, Robert Parker to extol the estate’s virtues, and the rest, as they say, is history. Today, Pascal Maurel and Vincent Maurel manage Clos Saint-Jean. They brought in Philippe Cambie in 2002 as their consultant. Since 2003, the brothers have completely turned this previously unknown estate around.
Clos Saint Jean La Combe des Fous comes primarily from an old vine Grenache planted at the start of the 20th century. The blend is usually 60% Grenache, 20% Syrah, 10% Cinsault, and 10% Vaccarese.
Combe des Fous literally means, the hill of the fool. The hill, in this case, is located in the far southern reach of Le Crau which was left barren for many centuries because the layer of galets was so exceedingly deep that everyone assumed vines could never survive there. The fool in this situation is Edmund Tacussel, the great-great-grandfather of Vincent and Pascal Maruel who planted a Grenache vineyard on this site in 1905. That old-vine Grenache form the heart of this cuvée with a small amount of Syrah, Cinsault and Vaccarèse. La Combe des Fous is only made in the best vintages.
