Château d'Yquem

Château d'Yquem is the only estate ranked Premier Cru Supérieur in the 1855 Classification, and the most famous sweet wine in the world. Robert Parker awarded 100 points to the 1811, 1847, 1945, 2001 and 2009. The Lur-Saluces family owned Yquem from 1785 until 1999, when LVMH took ownership, and Thomas Jefferson was among its early admirers.

The vineyard covers about 100 hectares of Sémillon and Sauvignon Blanc on a hilltop in Sauternes. Pickers pass through the vines many times each autumn to gather only grapes touched by noble rot, so yields are tiny, and in poor years no Yquem is made at all. The wine matures in new oak and can live for more than a century. Y, or Ygrec, the estate's dry white, has been made since 1959.