Loire 2023 Releases

This is a warmer, south-facing site than Fumet. In 2019 there is wonderful weight from the peachy nectarine fruit and a floral lift. Just gorgeous right now, and the weight will carry it so well through a few years in the cellar.

Bertrand Minchin’s wines just keep getting better. This north-facing limestone site is cool and late ripening. In a warm year like 2020 it soars. There is such a fine acidity and outstanding length, with so much persistence on the palate. We can’t wait to see how the fruit and acidity entwine further with some bottle age.

Complex, smoky and floral on the nose. This is terroir-driven Sauvignon Blanc, with superb texture and balance. It is precise and layered, full of savoury, dried herb and grassy notes on the palate. Impressive length. A perfect accompaniment to fish dishes or with goats cheese.

As the name suggests, this cuvée has no dosage, and so has not a drop of residual sugar. As a result, the wine expresses abundant freshness and minerality, supported by bright citrus and green fruit. The 2017 has a bright refreshing acidity and subtle richness, thanks to its oak ageing.

This new cuvée was introduced in 2019. It is made from young vines across three parcels, all of which Damien has planted himself. They have all been pruned in the goblet fashion, which encourages small bunches to ripen: Damien is seeking an intensity of flavour. This wine has a lovely white fruit and floral character. Easy and appealing.

This Savennières has a brilliant attack. It is pithy and weighty, with plenty of energy. It grown on sandy soils over schist bedrock and the resulting wine is vinous and saline. A little oak gives structure to the palate and the finish shows ripe, concentrated fruit.

This cuvée had formerly been known as Blanc Fumé. It is a blend of equal parts marl, clay, and flinty soils from across the Pouilly-Fumé appellation. It’s hardly fitting to call this Dagueneau’s ‘entry level’ wine, but it is probably their most accessible. There is ample green fruits and a superbly expressed chiselled texture.

This cuvée had formerly been known as Blanc Fumé. It is a blend of equal parts marl, clay, and flinty soils from across the Pouilly-Fumé appellation. It’s hardly fitting to call this Dagueneau’s ‘entry level’ wine, but it is probably their most accessible. There is ample green fruits and a superbly expressed chiselled texture.

Silex is one of the Dagueneau signature wines, and has brought an obscure name for a type of soil - flint - into the fine wine mainstream. It is smoky, tight, and typically powerful. This is quintessential Dagueneau. It comes from various parcels around the hill of St Andelain with different exposures, making for a wholly complex, enthralling, and long-lived wine.

This comes from a similar site to the Silex parcels, but is slightly lower and north-west facing, making it fractionally cooler. This means it excels in warm vintages. It is a scintillatingly wine with outstanding length.

This comes from a similar site to the Silex parcels, but is slightly lower and north-west facing, making it fractionally cooler. This means it excels in warm vintages. It is a scintillatingly wine with outstanding length.

Pur Sang is French for thoroughbred, and his is indeed a first rate cuvée. It comes from a 3 hectare parcel of south-facing vines grown on a mixture of limestone and flint, of which roughly two are selected for Pur Sang (the balances goes into Blanc etc...). It might be south facing, but the soils here is a cool one, and the wine has a supreme amplitude. It expands across the palate before racing to a long, taut finish. It shows huge concentration, and will only benefit from bottle age. Enticing style, with weighty precision and nervous tension.

Pur Sang is French for thoroughbred, and his is indeed a first rate cuvée. It comes from a 3 hectare parcel of south-facing vines grown on a mixture of limestone and flint, of which roughly two are selected for Pur Sang (the balances goes into Blanc etc...). It might be south facing, but the soils here is a cool one, and the wine has a supreme amplitude. It expands across the palate before racing to a long, taut finish. It shows huge concentration, and will only benefit from bottle age. Enticing style, with weighty precision and nervous tension.

Silex is one of the Dagueneau signature wines, and has brought an obscure name for a type of soil - flint - into the fine wine mainstream. It is smoky, tight, and typically powerful. This is quintessential Dagueneau. It comes from various parcels around the hill of St Andelain with different exposures, making for a wholly complex, enthralling, and long-lived wine.

This parcel is quintessential Chinon: at the top of the hill overlooking the Loire river, its flood plains, and the charming eponymous town. It is named after the huge and statuesque oak tree that grows at its edge. Its excellent position affords it good ripening and drainage. The soil here is clay and sandstone, and produces a wine with a pretty red fruit structure, and some distinctively spicy notes. In 2020 its ripeness and freshness chime in harmony. The wine has a lighter frame than that of the Varenne and Dioterie, and a long, elegant finish.

This is unquestionably the flagship wine of the Joguet estate. The vineyard lies right next to the domaine and was the first single vineyard that Charles Joguet championed. Its north-east facing slope and old vines planted on clay-limestone soils produce a wine with outstanding energy, spice, and density. It is profoundly deep but with no heaviness. There is such a sweet intensity to the Cabernet Franc fruit, and a mouthwatering salinity ensuring excellent ageing potential.

This Pinot is all vinified and aged in stainless steel tank. This method helps capture the variety’s purest fruit, which in this case is ripe raspberries and redcurrants, with a charming minty lift. There’s a subtle graphite note running through the palate. Persistent and delicately light-boded at the same time. Served a little chilled this will be a thirst-quenching delight.

2021 was a tricky year to get Pinot right in Sancerre. So instead of ploughing on as usual, Luc took the brave decision to make a wine that sits at the stylistic antipathy of his natural proclivity for full-bodied, structured Pinot. He handled the 2021 fruit with a light touch, using 100% whole bunch, and a short maceration with a light pressing. The resulting wine is light, bright, refreshing and wonderfully drinkable - what the French call 'digeste'. It has the prettiest accent of that noble vegetal lift you get in the best Loire reds. It will make a great aperitif red, excellent if served a little cooled.

This is bursting with bergamot freshness. As always, Luc says it showed the best balance between acidity and pH in the cellar, meaning the wine tastes vibrant and fresh without being overly bracing and acidic. Pieuchaud is a flinty-soiled lieu-dit in the commune of Thauvenay in the south-east of the Sancerre appellation. Luc decided to isolate this vineyard after noting it always produced fruit with great maturity whilst maintaining that high acidity - the secret to single vineyard wines in his opinion. It is saline and savoury, making it an excellent food wine with plenty of ageing potential.

For complexity, depth of flavour, and interest, it’s hard to beat this ancestral method sparkling wine from Vincent Carême. So vinous and lively, it’s delicious in youth, and fascinating with some age. It’s made by transferring the still sweet and fermenting grape juice into bottle, and then trapping the subsequent carbon dioxide as it continues to ferment to dryness in the bottle. No dosage is added, though the spent yeast cells are expelled, leaving a brilliant, crystalline sparkling wine behind. It has such a wonderful depth and complexity on the nose, with a vinous structure on the palate, and a salty zing. The creamy mousse wraps around crunchy apple fruit. Experience from tasting back vintages of this cuvée shows me this wine ages brilliantly, and will develop complex depth, and savoury precision with a few years in bottle.

This is the jewel in the crown of this domaine. It comes from a limestone (tuffeau) site overlooking the Loire which is so steep it has to be worked by horse instead of tractor. It has such a chalky note on the nose, it almost reminds me of Sancerre grown on terres blanches soils. With greengage and lime singing out, and mineral energy and tension driving it forward, this is a brilliant wine you’ll wish you bought more of.

This is everything we’ve been looking for in a dry Vouvray: precise, chiselled Chenin fruit, balanced weight, sappy freshness, and flinty finish. It comes from clay and flint soils around the domaine, andin 2020 has an electric energy. It’s so bright, and with a clean, precise weight and length, it’s hard to imagine a better example of the appellation for the price.

This is such a juicy, inviting delight. It has wonderfully primary floral notes, and Cabernet Franc’s structured freshness. Zappy and delicious, and brilliant if served a little chilled.

Grown on schist and galet roulé soils between the Lac de Grandlieu and the Atlantic Ocean, where the thin topsoil produces a very fine example. It has a touch of tropical fruit along with the salty, leesy freshness, and a creamy texture on the palate. Excellent value.