Memories of passion and emotions. Henrik Jelert is a great wine lover and loyal friend of Cos d’Estournel. Danish by birth, American by adoption and always between the two continents, he takes the floor to tell “his” Cos d’Estournel, and share his philosophy to create a cellar…
“My passion for wine actually started with my passion for food. Thanks to my mother, who was an excellent cook, I developed very early on an affinity for food. In high school, I didn’t have a lot of money, so I subscribed to all the magazines I could afford to subscribe to, that dealt with food and wine.
My first encounter with Cos came right at that time, in 1982: a friend had bought a 1976 for me to try, and although it was obviously too young, the impression it made on me, even 40 years later, has made me a very consistent friend of Cos and wines.
Now, every time I see the pagodas on the label, it brings me right back to high school. After that, every time I could afford a bottle of wine, I hoped it would be a bottle from Saint-Estèphe.
“It’s as if Cos has been an old friend that I reconnect with every year.”
Then, my cellar really began when my identical twins were born, in 1996: I had to make critical decisions about what to invest in that vintage, a really beautiful one to choose from. I naturally bought Cos d’Estournel in quantity, because I thought it would be meaningful to buy Cos in quantity from the year my twins were born.
Since then, it’s as if Cos has been an old friend that I reconnect with every year, or a time-machine that brings you back to vivid and meaningful memories.
“With Cos, you can travel.”
Today, the wines that make me dream are not different from when I began building my cellar: they are the ones that transport me in time and in place. It happened to me last night: I sampled the 2002 and 2005 vintages of Cos, both testimonies of what the best vintages can do on this terroir.
These two wines immediately stunned me: it is obvious, right from the beginning, that they come from the same place, although in a different vintage, and they brought me right to this very place. With Cos, you can travel without leaving the comfort of your dining table, but for this same reason, it is a wine that, because of the strong emotional connection I share with it, cannot be enjoyed in one place only.
Cos is a well-dressed traveler, that knows what it’s doing and why it’s there, with worldly elegance.
Circling back, I think Cos d’Estournel bears the word “gravity” in its DNA, through its facilities, but also because I always tend to gravitate around it. I would dream to go back to the 1976 and 1996, for the emotional reasons evoked earlier, and I would love to properly taste the 1982, that I have sampled only once, because it was the year that I discovered Cos d’Estournel.
However, the ideal scenario would be to come and taste it at the estate, where it belongs and where it can create the strongest memories!”
