Michelin To Rate Château Latour As Soon As It Can Find It

Facing questions over the most conspicuous omission from its first Bordeaux wine selection, the Michelin Guide confirmed Tuesday that Château Latour, the Pauillac first growth absent from every tier of the 83-estate list, went unrated because inspectors have so far been unable to find it, sources confirmed. The estate’s 116-acre walled vineyard sits on the D2 north of Bordeaux, behind a signposted gate, beneath a stone tower that appears on the label of every bottle.

“This is not an integrity question. It is a navigation question,” a guide spokesperson said, reading from a prepared statement. “We tried Google Maps. We tried Waze. Briefly, we tried Apple Maps, which is how three of our inspectors came to be stranded in Death Valley, California. We fully intend to rate the château. We have heard it is good. We simply have to find it first.” The spokesperson then unfolded a paper map of the Médoc and rotated it several times.

Inspectors successfully located and rated both properties directly adjacent to the estate, awarding each two grapes after what the guide described as flawless anonymous fieldwork. Asked how a methodology capable of finding 83 wine estates could miss a national landmark visible from a public road, Michelin called its location success rate “well above industry standard” and noted that no rating system finds every château.

Château Latour did not respond to a request for comment, which the guide cited as further evidence that the property may not exist.

At press time, an inspector had been located on the shoulder of the D2, asking a passing motorist whether they should have taken that last left instead of merging onto the expressway.