Les Griottes (Anjou, Loire)

Sébastien Dervieux (Babass) of Les Griottes Saint Lambert du Lattay, Anjou (Loire)
Pat Desplats (pictured on right with Philippe Jambon) and Sébastien Dervieux are vignerons/winemakers who belong to the group of the wildest rebels of the natural-wine movement, along with people like Claude Courtois, Jean-Pierre Robinot, Olivier Cousin or Philippe Jambon. Like these winemakers, they don't only vinify without lab yeasts or any of the usual additives tricks, but they don't use any SO2 either, no sulfur addings anytime during the vinification and nothing at bottling either. Pat Desplats is also among the very few who can make liquoreux sweet whites without any SO2, something deemed impossible and that would render the Coteaux-du-Layon producers sleepless if they dared to try or even think doing it. There are a handful of winemakers who can make SO2-free sweet whites : these inspired winemakers are Bruno Schueller in Alsace, Philippe Jambon in Beaujolais, Claude Courtois and Jean-Pierre Robinot in the Loire, Anne-Marie Lavaysse in the Languedoc, and Pat & Sébastien of Les Griottes... I remember tasting Philippe jambon's sweet whites from a bunch of glass jars in his cellar (they hadn't seen any SO2 either) in the Beaujolais in 2007, Pat Desplats was there too and the evening in Philippe's cellar was wild that day. Great rare wines, read my modest tasting notes for these extraordinary drops of God.
Pat can be wild in the literary sense of the word, which was the case the day before my visit was scheduled, so blame it on a particularly-dense workload the previous evening, he couldn't come in person the following day... The good side of this untimed incident was that I could meet his associate Sebastien, who shares the same spirit and the same free-wheeling adventure. The Domaine des Griottes was started in the early 2000s' by the two rebels shortly after Pat Desplats and his wife Claire settled in Saint Lambert du Lattay. They wanted will to make wines on the most traditional way, both in the vineyard and in the cellar, where the wines take sometimes all the time they need. Their vineyard surface has varied since the early years and it is now about 9 hectares. As you may know, the Appellation bureaucracy doesn't like too much authentic, non-formatted wines and after trying without success in the beginning to get the agrément that they deserved (Anjou & Coteaux du Layon) if you consider the vineyards location and the authenticity of the wines, they stopped asking for it and bottle all their wines as vin de table (table wine).

Sébastien Dervieux in the cellar Sébastien and Pat work mainly in two ot three locations split between Saint Lambert du Lathay and Saint Aubin, some of their vineyard tools being stored at a young vigneron's facility (Jerome Saurigny) in Saint Aubin. The presses (there are 4 or 5 of them, all traditional vertical presses) and the resin vats are in a long, non-insulated building which is part of a farm, and the surface cask cellar sits somewhere else, also near a farm, in an old stone building with a soul.
They're farming their vineyard organicly, doing the work mostly by themselves, with varieties being Chenin Blanc, Cabernet Franc & Cabernet Sauvignon, Pineau d'Aunis, Gamay, Grolleau, Chardonnay and Sauvignon. When there's lots of work in the vineyard, they hire Benoit and Laurent, two young part-time workers who know well the different tasks.
The vinifications are non interventionist, with indigenous yeasts and long élevage on the lees, sometimes several years. They even have some casks in the cellar that they never bottled or even topped up for years, and when you sip this wine you think that they want to keep it for themselves and their friends. Some are more lucky and can have these secret casks bottled : Pierre Jancou when he managed Racines (the wine bar/restaurant in Paris) discovered such a private cask with a wine from year 2004 when he visited in 2007. He loved the wine and could convince Pat & Sébastien to bottled it so he could serve it in his wine venue. Happy man ! read the story here (in French). Young Chenin Blanc on schistsTheir vineyards are often on a densely-schistic soil, which makes different wines than when the limestone dominates. The wines on schists are more on the mineral side than on the fruit side. THe Vouvray wines for example which are more on limestone are more opulent while here the wines are more sharp and mineral.
We stop first at a 40-year old Sauvignon plot [picture at the top], a relatively productive vineyard. This plot like a few others that they have in this area is right next the Layon river : you just have to walk to the trees and follow a narrow, slippery path down to the river. A few vines miss here and there in the Sauvignon vineyard, they have to replant them when they find the time. Sébastien picks a big piece of schist on the ground and shows how it crumbles easily in the hands.
Next to this plot we walk into a 0,5-hectare vineyard that they planted in 2004 [pic above] and looks very healthy. They made their first real harvest in this plot last year, in 2009. As the vines weren't pushed with fertlizers and with this rocky soil underneath, it took more time than it would have on a conventional vineyard, but these vines are here to live a long, healthy life. The place is quite windy and Sébastien says that they had to put a wire to hold them. At the end of the plot they have some non-grafted vines which are more firmy rooted and can better handle the wind. The wine is not out yet but could be named Epona, Sébastien says, from the name of a goddess revered by the Celts in the ancient Gaul, Epona was a protector of horses, sort of. There will be an Epona cuvée 2009, 1700 bottles in all, and it will be on the market next autumn.
Pat to who I spoke later told me that they took care to plant densely, that is 7000 vines per hectare when in Anjou it's 5000 per hectare. He thus can't drive the tractor between the rows in this plot but they do all the work by hand. THe work is very basic, he says : first, the pruning, then, they go twice or three times in the season to cut some branches, a plowing and also later a clawing to get rid of some weeds, two copper sprayings and that's all. Also at the plantation they didn't tie the baby vines on sticks which helps make them stronger. They didn't de-budd, let the vineyard go very elementary, with a goblet pruning for a better light exposition and to keep the vineroot in the shadow in summer thanks to a wider foliage volume. It's also better to keep in check the alcohol levels. He stresses that it's not the alcohol that holds the wine but the acidity coupled with the minerality.Checking one of the many young fruit treesPat Desplats has also been replanting fruit trees here and there in the vineyard like it used to be in the past. This is also a good way to break the monoculture mold even if the vineyards here are bordered with wooded areas. He didn't plant ordinary fruit trees but he got the young plants from a friend of Jean-Pierre Robinot in the Jasnières area, and these trees are from authentic ancient varieties, not modern selection clones. BTW, he had barely had the time to plant them that he had a control on the spot from the agricultural board, which is a strange move when you plant for the sake of diversity and select real and authentic varieties. Happily, his plantings were under the tree-counts/vineyard-surface ratio at which the administrative bureaus see a problem, so everything is fine. Among all these fruit trees and vineyards he plans to put some 10 beehives. He has the right to pu 9 beehives without declaration to the Administration [yes, there is a compulsory declaration of beehives to the Administration beyond 9 units, read the attached Pdf file from the Ministère...], so he will probably put some 9 beehives and will thus make some 100 kg of honey yearly, which is great.
Pat says also that after 10 years, the winery investments beginning to be paid back, they plan to change the statutes of their agricultural farm and downsize to the equivalent of 3 hectares for each of them, because the compulsory social-contributions (health, retirement etc...) and taxes are getting punitively heavy once you've paid back the loans. He says that staying small is the best way to adapt in these conditions. There is a special status named Cotisant Solidaire that allows small-size agricultural ventures to stay out of the full weight of the tax and social-contributions system. It's the equivalent for the small agricultural farms of the auto-entrepreneur status, from what I understand.Entering the cask cellar of Les GriottesThe stone building with the cask cellar has already this old-farm feel on its outside, without a hint of countryside gentrification, you know, these farms and buildings that are so overtly renovated by big money that they have lost all their charm in the way, gone and replaced by real-estate pride. Here, if it had been the case, I'm sure that the wild yeasts would have fled too and that the wines would have had this vibrant life. But the building sits in its juice from the door to the gutterless roof, and when you open the door, you breath the real life accumulated through generations of farmers, and that's not only in the imagination of a city dweller longing for rural life. Beaten earth on the ground, small windows through which birds might come and go I guess, and in the back, a mid-level opening (now closed with wooden shutter - see pic on right) through which the harvested grapes were hauled inside in the past for vinification.
Another thing interesting in that winery is that Pat has an old mare with which they haul the grapes at harvest. This is an old horse now and she isn't asked to hard a job. Otherwise, Pat has a common friend with Olivier Cousin who lends him his two horses when he wants to plow a one-hectare plot at spring. When he will have downsized, maybe he will do more with the horses. Pat says that in the region, Olivier Cousin is the guy in the Loire who makes the most of the plowing job with his horses. They of course all know each other and share information about their work in addition to sharing good time together.Tasting a few winesI had tasted several wines from Les Griottes at Buvons Nature last december, with Pat Desplats (picture on left), and that's a pleasure to taste some more here. Sébastien grabs a few bottles, and opens them. He begins our tasting spree with the words "Santé, Bohneur, Prospérité, Joie dans les Coeurs"...Sébastien (or Jérome who took part to this tasting) opened a bottle of sparkling first :
__ Les Griottes Moussaillon 2009, a sparkling white and blend of Chenin (majority), Sauvignon and Chardonnay. It's a 2009 méthode ancestrale, meaning that there was no adding of any sort, no sugar or liqueur : the wine was bottled before finishing its primary fermentation and the pressure built in with the fermentation going on. The degorgeage was done manually and the bottle completed with the same wine. Very pleasant wine, and after a few minutes while we chat, the aromas seem to come out. It's light in alcohol, maybe 12° or 12,5° he says, but as you drink that like juice you may drink more than you should. There is a bit of residual sugar, if not much. Costs 12,5 € public price here. There were 5000 bottles made of it.
__ Les Griottes Navines Anjou 2007. A golden color Chenin. Named from the cadastral name of the plot. Got oxydized notes after bottling, he says, but it's coming back in line now. In the mouth, lots of freshness, the wine is dry. The malo ferm was completed here. Nut aromas. No turbidity. Sébastien says that when turbid, a wine is sometimes difficult to market, when the consumers are not open to the question of unfiltered wines. He says that a good sommelier can make the difference. Public price about 10 €.
__ Les Griottes, la Ptite Gâterie. Red table wine (2008). Pineau d'Aunis, Gamay, Grolleau. Grolleau is like Pineau d'aunis one of these nearly-extinct Loire varieties that are vinified back to life by daring vignerons here and there, often coming from the natural-wine movement. Very aromatic wine, quite concentrated, purple color. the wine macerated till christmas and was bottled in the following summer. They tend to do these blends rather than make separate single-varieties cuvées and bottlings. The blending brings a balance which is interesting, he says.
__ Les Griottes red, a mystery bottle without label, Sebastien is not sure what it is and will determine while tasting. First, he sees that it's a 2008 because they didn't make any wine in casks for that vintage, so the nose is different. It's a blend of Cabernet Franc and Cabernet Sauvignon, the name of the cuvée is La Griotte, a vin de table too. Bottled in november or december 2009. 2008 is not a year as easy for wines as 2007. More austere wine, some tannins. It's not yet on the market, they wait that the wine finds its marks and opens in the glass. Spider web on a sulphur wick...Now, you doubt that they never use SO2 ? As we were tasting, I see a small number of metal wires with cask cork-bungs hanging on the wall. Actually, one of Jerome Saurigny young children who had arrived with his wife pointed to them asking what that was. Sébastien showed how sulphur was attached at the end, set on fire and plunged at mid-height into the empty cask, the opening being closed for a few minutes with the bung. That's when I see the spider web at the end of the thing, where the tissue with sulphur used to hang. I ask him to stand still for a picture of the living proof (you didn't put it your self didn't you ?) of a sulphur-free vinification...
We now taste a long élevage wine :
__ Les Griottes Caroline 2004. Sweet Chenin. Very long fermentations, 5 years in casks. 100-year old vines. Bottled in november 2009. Color with amber notes. Not turbid. Cristallized quince on the nose. They made two 400-liter casks of it. Harvested between november 15th and the end of november. Beautiful wine, very fresh. In the mouth, hints of raisins and whisky, peat. Residual sugar is maybe 120 gr to 150 gr here, thee was 24° potential end of november. See this short video by Marise Sargis of Patrick Desplats speaking about this wine.
I spoke lengthly with Patrick about his work and he told me that he waits very late so that the Botrytis has eaten into the grapes to transform into botryticin which is like a natural antibiotic. Plus, as it eats into the grape skins too, the yeast population is weakened, so the wines don't go high in alcohol, don't get jammy and keep a huge acidity and a nice freshness, yielding a vibrant balance between the sugar and the acidity. He says that this can be done only on deep-roots old vineyards. The young replanted vines that we saw are actually the successor of the Caroline vines. When they'll be 10 years old, he says, they'll begin to yield wines at 10° or 11° and will keep rooting deeper until they're 20 years old and then serious wines will begin to be made with them.
Antique, everlasting cask-liftThat's when Sebastien shows us how they bottle by gravity : they use a scale-looking system with chains and lift easily a full cask (the one on the picture is empty) high enough so that they can fill their bottles right in the cellar. That's indeed a very undisturbing bottling machine for a wine. They put a 4-spout gravity filler beneath and put the corks themselves. While lifting the cask, he discovers a hidden bottle behind, someone put a bottle aside it seems, he jokes. All these tools and things in the cellar are food for imagination for the children. They soon go outside play along the fence where the cows feed on hay. Filling our glasses straight from a caskNow, Sébastien offers us to taste from an old cask lying on the side along the wall :
__ Les Griottes. From a (forgotten) cask. Sébastien brings a wine thief full of the white wine... This is a sweet Chenin Blanc from 2003. They took some wine to taste and drink along the years and never topped it up, making this Chenin become some sort of magical vin de voile that tastes so well. The cask is now less than half filled and gets along pretty well. The wine is intense, complex and refined, a pleasure. I won't spit it even though I've a motorbike ride back to the Cher valley later that day, and potential ambushed breath-checks along the way. This 2004 vintage was the only year they made some passerillage (raisining). The grapes dried on the vines without maling botrytis. 17,5° alcohol potential. Pierre Overnoy tasted these sweet Chenins and loved them, that's not an easy public to get.The best salon in townTwo young vineyard workers joined during out cellar tasting. Benoit and Laurent, the two on the left are contract workers for different tasks in the vineyards of both Jérome Saurigny and Les Griottes. They don't have plans right now to set up a winery, but who knows...
I asked Pat about his Pineau d'Aunis, he says that it was an old Pineau d'Aunis plot that survived years of uprooting of this variety in the region. It's even the last Pineau d'Aunis plot of the village sector, it lies on an area which isn't even recommended by the Appellation area board to make red wines. So the people in the region when they havr some, they make Rosé de Loire with it. He says that this variety has fragile skins that rot easily but yields fruity and delicious wines. He has right now this 0,5 hectare of old vines but he will maybe plant more in the future. To make a comparison with the other rare variety, Grolleau, they have 0,7 hectare of Grolleau. He regrets that the region has massively planted Cabernet clones when these varieties make such delicious fruity and delicacy wines, the opposite of high-extraction, deep-color or high-alcohol wines. His P'tite Gâterie with its 11° is easy to drink, he says, and fits with the character of these varieties. Now, you know that Coteaux du Layon, which is a Loire Appellation, means "Layon slopes" in French. That's ironic because this video shows you how well-located on the Layon slopes these Griottes vineyards are, and the wines made from them are yet not labelled under the Appelation.
After walking through the vineyards, we were beginning to follow the path down to the Layon river when I had the idea to shoot this video. This was a first for me to experience so vividly the closeness and the relation between the vineyards and the layon. I try to figure how the mist coming from the river in the early-autumn evenings and mornings help transform the grapes. To reach the Layon river, we just had to follow a narrow and steep dirt path across the trees and soon after we fell upon a tiny piece of paradise : a private farmer-owned vineyard complete with a cabin and barbecue where I guess the fish from the river were fried on summer evenings. Listening to Jérome and Sébastien, I learned that this private plot is now managed by a vigneron. The river and its immediate surroundings is a haven of quietness. It is unusually low for this time of the year, they say. It might rise again in the folowing weeks.

Les Griottes' wines can be found in Paris at Racines as well as at Crus et Découvertes, at Cave de l'Insolite and Le Vin en Tête, the two latter being profiled on the Wineterroirs Cavistes page.
Les Griottes wines are exported to Japan through Eno Conexion, and also Hideaki Kito, a caviste in Nagoya.
Patrick has two children and Sébastien is the father of one.

Read about Vinosseur's Joseph Di Blasi visit at Domaine des Griottes. Les Griottesrue Layon49750 Saint Lambert du Lattaycell +33 6 82 56 80 75Les-Griottes' blogles [dot] griottes [at] laposte [dot] net

Pat & Babasse parted in 2012 (they're still good friends), each setting up their own winery. Here are the info for Sébastien Dervieux's winery : Les Vignes de Babasse Sébastien Dervieux 12 rue Rabelais 49750 Beaulieu sur Layon phone +33 6 82 00 32 67

Comments

[Mart]

Great piece. I love the gaterie, I kept a stash for quite some time can't get them here in Italy :-( Any change you visit the http://www.vinnatur.it or http://www.viniveri.net/ bertrand?

[Bertrand]

An invite from Italy, I like that.... and this country is the other hot region regarding natural wines and real food...and I'm sure somewhere I have some Italian ancestors...
I'll think about visiting, Mart, thanks for the suggestion.

[Kenton Erwin]

Hello,

Are you still planning to sell a "Epona" Cuvee this year? If so, please know that in the United States I own the rights to the word "Epona" and all things wine-related which use that name. Your wine could not be sold in the US, without infringing on my rights.

This is a very nice website you have. Good luck with the winemaking!
Kenton Erwin
[email protected]
Portland OR
USA

[Joseph Di Blasi]

Bertrand,

Thanks for the link! I just discovered it. Patrick and Gaelle were also up to visit me this year in Bergen, Norway. This was Patrick's first vacation in about 10 years, according to him! And we had a great time!

Cheers,