In the footsteps of the distinguished Tom C – dinner at Sandeman Room, Fonab Castle

 A glass of Don Fino Sherry from Sandeman in

the Fonab Bar to start the evening

We spent a great weekend at Fonab Castle on the outskirts of Pitlochry as my pre-birthday treat. Saturday night we were in Sandeman Room where we were expertly looked at after by James Payne, the maître d'hôtel at Fonab and responsible for the wine. I first met James back in the 1990s when he was at Pont de la Tour. From time to time sommeliers get a bad press for being arrogant. This certainly does not apply to James: he is a very good one  – very relaxed, very professional and knowledgeable and not at all intimidating. 

James Payne with the Sandeman 1982 Vintage Port 

Dinner in the Sandeman Room is a set menu – we also decided to go for the flight of recommended wines. We learned during dinner that we had the same table as the Scottish legend Tom Cannavan (Wine Pages).  

Tom Cannavan on a barrel throne in Chile 

The amuse bouche which included 

some foie gras and roasted apricot 

2016 Bone Dry, Van Buhl

Trocken, Pfalz 

(above and below)

Some grassy Sauvignon Blanc like – notes 

crisp acidity

Consomme – chicken, truffle and tarragon
– being poured over the ravioli

Character Amontillado Sherry, Sandeman
James' choice with the consommé

Scottish Salmon –
Confit of pink citrus - fennel - cucumber

There is almost always a dish that we forget to 
photograph before we are halfway through the dish 

The 2014 Astolabe Chenin Blanc, Wrekin Vineyard, 
Marlborough (NZ) was matched with the salmon 
Tasted on its own the Chenin has a delicately 
attractive character with interesting floral notes.
Unfortunately the sweetness in the salmon as well as the cucumber 
overpowers the Chenin – hiding the fruit while accentuating the acidity

Lamb 

2009 Ampodium, Côte Rotie, Domaine Rostaing
James kindly added this into our flight 
Lovely, sensuous and complex Côte Rotie
Kept under Coravin and first broached 
some five weeks ago 
Was a great match with the rare filet of lamb

2014 Vinha Grande, Douro
Still youthful and quite tannic but came into 
its own with the slow cooked lamb 

Pre-dessert
this fruit based  pre-dessert 
was a fine foil for the 2015 Vouvray Moelleux
from Vigneau Chevreau
(below)

Panna Cotta 
Lavender – textures of strawberry
 

The Panna Cotta needed something richer and 
more powerful than the Vouvray, 
which the 2015 Kika Noble late harvest Chenin Blanc
from Miles Mossop Wines in Stellenbosch  

Birthday chocs

All in all this was an excellent and very enjoyable meal – the high point of a great weekend stay at Fonab Castle, a wonderful place for a pampered few days away. 

Lunch@L'Aubinière, Saint Ouen-les-Vignes

1st April 2010

Five of us had a very agreeable, relaxed lunch at L'Aubinière yesterday. We all took the 34€ menu – I had mousseline of trout, gigot d'agneau and chocolate pudding. All the dishes were very good, although without the same inventiveness that you find at Jacky Dallais' La Promenade. 

For our apéro we had a very attractive bottle of 2005 Montouis demi-sec from Domaine Flamand-Deletang run by Olivier and Corinne Flamand, who have 8ha in Saint Martin le Beau. This is quite a rich, honeyed demi-sec from 2005 with well balanced acidity and not unreasonably priced at 30€.

2007 Clos de Rougemount, Vouvray sec, Domaine Vigneau-Chevreau

With the first course we took the 2007 Clos de Rougemont, Vouvray sec from Domaine Vigneau-Chevreau (28.50€). This special cuvée comes from the historic Abbaye de Marmoutiers on the eastern edge of northern Tours and had all the qualities associated with good 2007 Loire dry whites. Very clean and precise with good mineral length, this was a fine match with the mousseline of trout.

2006 Cuvée des Loups, Saumur-Champigny, Domaine de Nerleux

I knew the 2006 Cuvée des Loups (40€) from Régis and Elizabeth Neau was likely still rather young and so it proved. Powerful, well fruited (black) wine this was attractive to drink now but it is clear that with another two or three years in bottle that this will be more supple and complex as currently it is still a bit angular.

Hotel-Restaurant L'Aubinière,
29 Rue Jacques-Gautier
37530 Saint-Ouen-les-Vignes
Tel: 02.47.30.15.29
www.aubiniere.com

Foire aux Vins de Vouvray and an exciting new discovery

Entrance to the foire in the Caves de la Bonne Dame, Vouvray

I dropped into Vouvray's foire aux vins for a couple of hours this morning. This events are often interesting: they allow you to taste a number of different producers quickly and, although, the big names are often absent you may discover an exciting new producer. This was certainly the case today – no sign of Champalou, Foreau, Fouquet, Gaudrelle or Huet. Instead the best known producers present were Vigneau-Chevreau and Bourillon-Dorléans and furthermore I did discover an exciting producer who was new to me: Laurent Bonneau of the Domaine de la Croix des Vainqueurs in Chançay.

Laurent Bonneau

Laurent Bonneau is somewhat of a rarity in Vouvray – both a newcomer, who has started from nothing, and someone who had a a previous career before choosing to make wine. Laurent comes from Loches and worked previously in l'environment. After work experience at Château la Garde in Pessac-Leognan, he started in Vouvray two and a half years ago and has eight hectares. I tasted three of his wines (Le Bouchet) from 2008 – sec, demi-sec and moelleux. I was impressed by their purity and minerality. The demi-sec is vinified in barriques of two and three wines. These are bought from Château Pape-Clément. The 2008 demi-sec has a touch of spice, some concentration and attractive apricot and peach flavours. His apple, quince and honeyed 2008 Moelleux has 50 grams of residual sugar. It was picked between 18th-20th October and has a good balance between the sweetness and acidity with an emphasis on the fruit. "Last year the harvest was very late," Laurent explained. "We started picking for our sparkling wines on the 6th October. depending upon the year I make 50% sparkling and 50% still. "

Laurent Bonneau

Laurent's first vintage was 2006 – not an easy start. However, he told me about a liquoreux that he made that year. "After the 2007 vintage I visited Jacques Beaujeau (Château la Varière, Brissac-Quincé) and saw how he makes his Bonnezeaux and Quarts de Chaume. As I still had a grapes left on some of my vines I decided to have go at a making a liquoreux, so I got some of the pickers to come back and we picked on 11th November. The resulting wine has 180 grams of residual sugar and 9 gms of acidity." Laurent's sweet wine was clearly a success as it has impressed Noël Pinguet, who is not given to excessive compliments. "Noël came to visit recently and told me that my liquoreux was the best 2007 sweet wine in Vouvray. He did go on to say that Huet had made the best sweet Vouvray in 2006 and I agree with him."

It is good to see an exciting newcomer in Vouvray as Montlouis has recently been making much of the running recently.

Laurent Bonneau, Domaine de la Croix des Vainqueurs
20 bis Rue d'Amboise, 37210 Chançay.
Tel: 02.47.52.25.16. Email: l.bonneau@hotmail.fr

•

Other wines that impressed at the Foire:
Initially I chose to taste just the secs from the 20 producers showing their wines at this foire. I find tasting the dry wines a useful approach to select interesting producers – with little residual sugar to gloss over the defects. Like other foire aux vins there is a considerable range of quality and there were some very poor wines on show here – green, dilute and not fully clean. Some of the producers here sell most of their production on vrac (en citerne) to négociants, who I suspect are often more interested in price and quantity than quality. Regrettable but quite understandable if their business is supplying supermarkets with premier prix Vouvray.

Following on from the tasting back in late May at Thorman Hunt in London I was again impressed by the Vigneau-Chevreau wines. Christophe and Stéphane now run the estate, which has been biodynamic since 1999, taking over from Jean-Michel, their late father. I particularly liked their 2008 Sec, the 2007 Clos de Vaux demi-sec and the 2003 Château Gaillard Moelleux.

The Bourillon D'Orléans wines were well made – of the three secs (2008, 2007 and 2005) I tasted I preferred the 2005.

It was intresting tasting the wines of Daniel Jarry, which used to be imported into the UK by Yapp Brothers. I tasted their secs from 1998, 2000 and 1990 – all quite intriguing, especially the 2000, but very definitely old style.

Perhaps worth another look: Jean-Claude and Didier Aubert, Domaine Freslier, and Jean-Michel Gautier.

The tasting usefully confirmed that the top producers, who weren't present, overall deserve their positions at the top of the Vouvray tree.

•

Prospects for 2009?
Several producers expressed cautious optimism for the forthcoming vintage. Vouvray has so far escaped the hail that has hit some other parts of Touraine and the Central Vineyards, in particular Menetou-Salon. August is currently very hot – up to around 35˚ yesterday and today. The hot weather is forecast to continue. The current feeling is: 'une belle vendange en prospect' with the harvest starting at the end of September beginning of October. However as ever, what happens from now to the vintage will be crucial.

Tasting a few Loires@Thorman Hunt

The twice-yearly Thorman Hunt tasting is one London event I’ll always try to get to if possible. Unfortunately their spring tasting now coincides with the Decanter World Wine Awards Judging so I have been unable to make the last couple of editions and it may be longer than that. Fortunately the tasting is likely to be moved to March in 2010.

Gamay, two Muscadets and the Touraine Sauvignon

Importers Thorman Hunt was founded in 1978, concentrating mainly on individual French growers. The company is run by Jeremy Hunt. Their list of producers outside Bordeaux and Burgundy is particularly strong, especially from the Rhône, South West France and the Loire. Thorman Hunt doesn’t have the wacky element that is an integral part of Les Caves de Pyrene but it is solid and impressive producer portfolio.

As I was unable to make the spring tasting they kindly arranged to taste a few Loire’s that I picked out from those shown at the April tasting. I chose wines from producers that I either didn’t know or whose wines I hadn’t tasted recently, so, for instance, no Château Villeneuve who have long been part of the portfolio.

I started with the easy drinking 2008 Gamay Touraine from Château la Presle (Jean-Pierre Penet), Oisly. Youthful purple, warm red fruits – perhaps a little lean in the finish but a wine to enjoy chilled over a outdoors summer lunch or picnic. Sensibly closed with a screwcap, which Penet does specially for the UK market. So much more sensible than cork – real or synthetic.

Next a couple of 2008 Muscadet-Sèvre-et-Maines sur lie. The first Domaine de la Roche Renard (Isabelle and Philip Denis, Vallet) was OK but was easily put in the shade by 2008 Selections du Haut Pemions from Christophe and Joseph Drouard in Monnières, not far from Le Pallet. Also in screwcap – if there was a French wine designed for a screwcap it’s Muscadet – this has attractive lemony weight and good length. Delicious – bring on the plateau de fruits de mer!

Then the screwcapped 2008 Touraine Sauvignon from Château de Presle – initially quite rich and weighty and with good length, this needs two or three months in bottle to really knit together. “A few people have commented that it is not Sauvignon enough" but Jean-Pierre said that he picked a little bit later and this is how he wanted the wine to taste. I suspect the comments have come from people who still think that cat’s pee is classic Touraine Sauvignon. So it is if you want to drink unripe Sauvignon but if the grapes are picked when they are ripe the vegetal cat’s pee flavours will have given way to gooseberry, grapefruit and then more tropical fruit flavours.

Quincy, Sancerre and two Vouvrays

The ripe and full 2008 Quincy Domaine de Chevilly (Yves and Antoine Lestourge in Méreau in the west of the appellation) is New Zealand in style with asparagus notes. The last Sauvignon was the 2008 Sancerre from Jean-Paul Balland in Bué. One of these days I ought to find out whether there are more Ballands than Crochets in the small village of Bué – but I digress. The 2008 is a vat sample but suggests that it will be quite a weighty Sancerre.

Finally a couple of Vouvrays from the 28 hectare Vigneau-Chevreau biodynamic estate in Chançay: 2007 Cuvée Silex and 2007 Clos de Rougemount, Abbaye de Marmoutier. The estate is now run by Stéphane and Christophe Vigneau-Chevreau, the sons of Michel who died of cancer last summer. I haven’t met the sons but saw Michel on a number of occasions, especially at the Salon des Vins de Loire. He was a very charming and courteous man – I often wished that I liked his wines better.

However, the sons look to have moved the wines up to another level and I particularly liked the rich, concentrated and long Abbaye de Marmoutier – probably best described as a sec tendre. It retails for around £18 a bottle. The Abbaye was founded as far back as AD 372 and was destroyed during the French Revolution. Then phylloxera at the end of the 19th century finished off wine production at the Abbaye. In 1995 Michel Vigneau-Chevreau obtained a 50-year lease on the Clos de Rougemount and started to replant. Most of the vines are grafted but there is a plot (1600 vines) here of ungrafted Chenin Blanc.

After finishing the Loires I tasted a few other bits and pieces including the austere and precise 2007 Cuvée Marie Jurançon from Charles Hours and the rich and brooding 2005 Montus Madiran from Alain Brumont.

Thorman Hunt 4 Pratt Walk, London SE11 6AR Tel: 020 77356511

Links:
Jean-Paul Balland:
Vigneau-Chevreau