Loire – a few recently enjoyed bottles

Last night we had our first meal at Le Lézard Vert (Epeigné-les-Bois) under the new ownership. We were favourably impressed by the food and happy with the limited choice of wine where the Closerie de Chanteloup in Touraine Amboise features strongly. I have long been impressed with these wines. We tried their 2014 Sauvignon Blanc that has good concentration of fruit along with ripe acidity – typical of good 2014. 

We were particularly impressed by the 2014 Cuvée François Touraine Amboise. All too often this Cuvée is light, weedy and of little interest. In contrast this example is very attractive with a long concentration of rich black fruits – just lovely to drink. 

 This evening we enjoyed a couple of wines from Château de Villeneuve starting with 2009 Les Cormiers, Saumur Blanc with rich evolved fruit showing the benefit of a few years in bottle as well from this ripe vintage. Ready to drink now but can certainly be kept for a number of years yet.  

We followed this with a couple of bottles of 2005 Vieilles Vignes, Saumur Champigny also from Château de Villeneuve. I loved the wonderfully textured, succulent black fruits and now very soft tannins. The 2005 VV went perfectly with a simple roasted Barbary Duck that we had bought this morning in Montrichard Market.     

 

Touraine-Amboise: Foire aux Vins (August 15th)

Thomas Frissant, son of Xavier and Isabelle Frissant. Xavier is now president of Touraine-Amboise 

On Wednesday I spent around a couple of hours at the August edition of the Foire aux Vins d'Amboise, which is held in the tunnel under the château. I didn't manage to taste wines from all of the producers present. However, with a few exceptions it was the usual names who stood out: Xavier Frissant, François Péquin (Domaine des Bessons), Vincent Péquin (Domaine de la Tonnelerie) and Closerie de Chanteloup. As far as I know Coralie and Damien Delecheneau (La Grange Tiphaine), one of the Touraine-Amboise appellation's stand-out producers, don't do this Foire aux Vins. Certainly I have never seen them here.     

François Pequin pouring. He is Vice-President of AC Touraine-Amboise 

The very difficult climatic conditions of 2012 was a common complaint. François Péquin listed them for me. Firstly a mild January with temperatures up around 15˚C which encouraged the sap to rise early. This was followed by severe cold in February with temperatures down at -15˚C. Then a hot March and early April bringing on the vines early only to be hit by frost on 17th-18th April. High rainfall in May, June and July with a difficult flowering and widespread disease, particularly mildew.

Péquin also said that the grape skins this year were very tight and that bursts of hot weather tends to split the grapes, which may be bad news because of the high temperatures forecast for today and, especially, tomorrow. He also reported that Esca was a serious problem in his Sauvignon Blanc this year, which was a surprise as Esca is thought to be worse in dry conditions. 

In their roles as president and vice-president Xavier Frissant and François Péquin are hoping to be able to promote Amboise to cru status, so just Amboise would appear on the label rather than Touraine-Amboise. François suggested that the red might well be pure Côt (Malbec). It will be interesting to see the proposals but I'm far from convinced that Touraine-Amboise has quality in depth that would justify promotion to a cru; two steps in the pyramid above straight Touraine AC, which has some very good producers – the equal of virtually anybody in Touraine-Amboise. A suivre!         

The new chef de cave@Domaine des Bessons

Vincent Péquin

Willi Debenne of Closerie de Chanteloup

Thierry Denay (Domaine de la Croix)

Thierry Denay is the father of Brice Denay, who has recently set up on his own at the 7-ha Domaine du Breuil (06.09.44.38.19). 2011 was Brice's first vintage and I tasted his easy drinking, juicy Rouge Elégance. Made from 100% Cabernet Franc it shows promise and it will be interesting to see how Brice Denay develops at the Domaine du Breuil, where he has started the conversion to organic viticulture.        

 Elegance on the Plou stand 

A 2007 Montlouis and a 2009 Touraine Sauvignon

2007 Mémoire de Loire, Montlouis, Closerie de Chanteloup

As an interlude between the reports on the big France under one roof tasting here are notes on a couple of samples I have been intending to try for a while. The Closerie boys were over for France's independent wine producers tasting in January, while the 2009 Sauvignon Blanc from Jean-Christophe Mandard came from the Salon des Vins de Loire.

Closerie de Chanteloup

This Montlouis comes from a 22-hectare domaine sited close to the famous Pagoda de Chanteloup on the outskirts of Amboise. The domaine used to be part of an estate owned by the Duc de Choiseul, a prime minister during the reign of Louis XV. The domaine is run now by three producers: Vincent Guichard, Frédéric Plou and Willy Debenne. Five generations of the Guichard family have run the domaine. In 2003 Vincent took over a small part of the family vines along with some others that he rented, making a total of six hectares. In December 2005 he was joined by Frédéric Plou, who decided to leave the large Plou domaine of 60 hectares in Chargé to be involved in something smaller. (I have yet to be impressed by the Plou family wines.) Willie Debenne joined Vincent and Frédéricin Janauary 2007 leaving his job in industry.

2007 Mémoire de Loire, Montlouis, Closerie de Chanteloup

This lightly golden wine shows how good a demi-sec can be with its combination of minerality and quite austere, racy acidity – typical of the 2007 vintage – and peachy, honeyed sweetness and good length. Impressively good!

Previous postings on Closerie de Chanteloup here and here.

The Pagoda de Chanteloup

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Jean-Christophe Mandard

2009 Cépage Sauvignon, Touraine, Jean-Christophe Mandard

This pale coloured wine is a decidedly lean, lemony, gooseberry and grassy example of a Touraine Sauvignon – 'bracing' or 'tonique' probably sums it up. This 2009 Sauvignon is not unripe; it doesn't have those reeky cats' pee aromas. I would prefer it to be a little riper with more complexity, although to be fair it is very young and may well take on more weight in bottle. There may also be later bottlings but on this showing I prefer Jean-Christophe's reds.