France’s famed Burgundy region was recently named a UN world heritage site in July by the United Nation’s cultural body. And yet another reason to praise the region, a rare vintage from the area has surfaced as the world’s most expensive wine. A Richebourg Grand Cru bottle sells at a whopping $15,195 as per the Wine-Searcher website list of the 50 dearest vintages.
Wine-Searcher’s table of priciest wines includes 40 Burgundies, with just five non-French wines making the cut. One is Californian Stanley Kroenke’s Screaming Eagle Cabernet Sauvignon coming in at 14th place with a price tag of $2,884 and the others are the result of two German winemakers, Egon Mueller and Joh. Jos. Pruem, whom each have two wines on the list, including Mueller’s Scharzhofberger Riesling Trockenbeerenauslese demi-sec selling for $6,630 a bottle in fourth place.
UNESCO (United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization) recognized the uniqueness of the vineyards of the Cote de Nuits and the Cote de Beaune, which produce some of the finest red wines in the world made from pinot noir and chardonnay grapes. The Richebourg Grand Cru was a Cote de Nuits created by the ingenious winemaker, Henri Jayer who died in 2006 at age 84. Jayer was against utilizing chemicals in the winemaking process and believed in small-scale production, only turning out an estimated 3,500 bottles per year.
It should come as no surprise that another Henri Jayer wine, his Cros-Parantoux Vosne-Romanee Premier Cru, which comes from a tiny 1.01 hectare (2.5 acre) parcel, steals third place on the list at $8,832 a bottle. The detailed examination that formed the most recent update concerned more than seven million wines of all vintages, taking an average price per bottle.
Romanee-Conti, Burgundy’s most acclaimed wine, came in second on the list at $13,314 and the vineyard has a total of six bottles on the table. Vosne-Romanee and Montrachet are other “grand crus” from Burgundy, which are also among the priciest ones. France’s Bordeaux wine region, notable to many, only has two wines on the list, both Pomerols: the Petrus and a Le Pin.
Founded in London in 1999, Wine-Searcher releases periodic updates to its 50 most expensive wines list, which is based on prices from nearly 55,000 wine merchants and producers around the world.
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