Chateau Latour- "Forts de Latour" 1978

There are few - if indeed any - more evocative names to the drinker of Bordeaux than that of Château Latour. The merchants who drew up the 1855 classification of the wines of the Médoc may well have placed Lafite, later to be Château Lafite-Rothschild, at the very top of the four estates they ranked as first growths, but that hasn't stopped legions of wine drinkers placing it at the top of their own personal list of favourites. I would have to count myself among those who, on the whole (because no first growth can dominate in every single vintage) favour the wines of Château Latour over those from the other first growth châteaux.

 Les Forts de Latour, introduced in 1966, typically 70% Cabernet Sauvignon and 30% Merlot, of which there are perhaps 130,000 bottles produced each year. Although often referred to as a second wine this description is not wholly appropriate, as the wine tends to be sourced from the same vines outside L'Enclos every year; as such it is a distinctive wine, made from a recognised and delimited set of vines on a distinctive terroir, rather than purely a vessel for rejected fruit. Having said that, the fruit of young vines within L'Enclos, and also some aliquots of the L'Enclos wine tasted and deemed of insufficient quality for the grand vin, might be included here. The wine sees an élevage in 50% new and 50% used oak.