Move over Pape Clement - there’s a new kid on the block. While the aforementioned estate might hold the auspicious title of being the oldest fine wine in Bordeaux (bottling it’s 714th vintage in 2020), Château Haut Batailley is one of the youngest. In fact this baby of Bordeaux is “just” 78 years young.

Well... yes and no. Like many fine wine estates in Bordeaux, the lines have been blurred in order to avoid paying the steep French inheritance tax. The estate proper in fact has fifth growth status, but was divided into two separate properties in 1942. This was decided by the Borie brothers, with Francois Borie keeping the smaller Medoc vineyard - which became Haut Batailley and Marcel Borie, who kept Chateau Batailley. The family kept the domaine separate in name only, and managed and harvested vines from Haut Batailley and Château Batailley together. In doing so, Château Haut Batailley remained a family affair.

This remained the case until 2017, when the Cazes family purchased the vineyard. Jean-Charles Cazes is of course famous for being the proprietor of Chateau Lynch Bages. The irony here is that the Borie family had been looking to expand their portfolio - they were already owners of Château Ducru Beaucaillou in St.Julien and Chateau Grand Puy Lacoste in Pauillac - and had begun bidding on Lynch-Bages. So not only did Cazes pip them to the post on their preferred property, he bought them out of their own!

The wine has shown impressive growth in the past 15 years, rising from an average low of €173 a bottle in 2003 to an average high of €666 in Q4 2019. This clearly depends on the vintage - the record for this wine has been set with the fantastic 1982, sold for almost €900 a case in 2016. A case of the 90-pointer 2017 (the fabled 1982 scored one point lower on aggregate scoring) is currently (Q1 2020) selling for €500. The huge surge in price is undoubtedly a reflection on the change of ownership, rather than the quality of the wine. Savvy investors might like to take a gamble on the higher scoring 2015 filling its potential in several years. Lower-priced and higher scoring than its siblings, this wine is definitely one to watch.