Thésée, Touraine (Loire)
Here we are again along the Cher river, in an area of the Loir-et-Cher département with a vibrant (and growing) community of artisan growers and winemakers, and in 2018 this was the debut for a newcomer couple
who moved here from Canada, Anouk Lavoie-Lamoureux and her husband
Paul-André Risse who named their domaine Les Jardins de Theseiis. The name refers to the very ancient history of the village of Thésée, a populated area with a 2000-year history dating back from the Romans (see here the impressive wall still standing just outside the village) which formerly beared the name of Theseiis in the 1500s'.
Anouk and Paul-André are making the first vintage of their own here, not exactly their first wines as last year they made wine with Bruno Allion. You may remember that Bruno was considering to retire and here it is, Anouk and Paul-André are taking over half of his vineyards after working with him a ferw months, both in the vineyards and in the cellar, to master the domaine's culture and build their experience in natural winemaking (you saw them at work last year when their were picking the Romorantin for Bruno).
I was lucky to be there when they were picking the Pineau d'Aunis, a variety I love for its delicate but still gently-tannic reds (we need more
of it !). Anouk and Pierre-André are also using Bruno's cellars and chai, you certainly recognize the place, that's also here that the large group of biodynamic growers in the area meets for biodynamic workshops so that eveyone can master the Horn Manure making process or the Horn Silica burying. Bruno even if retired, will still give a help during these exciting gatherings where other growers (vegetable for example) can attend. Here you can see Paul-André ready to unload boxes of Pineau d'Aunis freshy hauled from the vineyard 5 minutes away, using their vintage Soviet-made 4x4 Niva. The car is pretty rustic (I travelled myself thousands of kilometers in such a car the last time I was in Russia, definitely not a sports car...) but it still runs fine although they had problems to start it when i visited (the battery was failing if i remember).
Here we are on the parcel of Pineau d'Aunis, it's pretty dry after months without rain or almost. there's been issues with mildew but overall the fruit load is not bad. The parcel is of course organically farmed, with also biodynamic preparations now and then and this will continue under the new owners. Anouk and Paul-André have been convinced for years that tending properly the vineyard and respecting the soil is a prerequisite for making the wines they liked to drink themselves.
For one, the weather was pretty nice that day, sunny, not too warm, and the morning temperature was pretty mild too, not too cold. There was a good ambiance and spirits among ther pickers, Anouk and Paul hired a service company for the picking, the boss is Oliver Pineau who already knows Bruno's parcels and who does a terrific job, doing the work on the ground among his workers with an easy-going attitude. Plus he has the same approach as theirs for the vines, he himself is focused on the sap-flow issues in the vines, which is important at the pruning stage.
Here are bunches of Pineau D'Aunis before they were picked, as you can see they're pretty nice and healthy although many of the leaves were affected by the mildew disease. This first year was a bit tricky for their start, with the occurence of mildew and they had to learn the plowing process for the parcels, something
which unlike pruning and the rest they had never done themselves before. But first take a look
at these bunches, if you're a Pineau d'Aunis lover like I know many of you are, you can't but rejoy at these scenes, 2018 will yield lots of the pale red here and they'll also make rosé of it... I tasted these beautiful grapes, they so good, surprisingly good although the leaves show the strains of a tough mildew season, no rotten grapes, very healthy, some grapes dried out but nothing worring. On left Paul show me a dry berry, it tastes like raisin, delicious.
For the intended rosé they picked part of their grapes the morning I visited and left the other part hanging for the red, it'd be picked the same day in the afternoon. Samely for the Romorantin, they picked the grapes for the dry Romorantin but left some bunches hanging to make a little bit of sweet liquoreuw for their daughter who was born this year (they're young parents !), so that she'll have a birthday wine she can drink when she's 20, there'll be 150 bottles maybe of this liquoreux...
Here is how Anouk and Pierre-André ended up settling here for good after their former Canadian life : Both of them were living in Quebec and were biology researchers there.
Paul-André who is French got his PhD in pharmacology in France and then moved to Canada for a postdoctoral scholarship, something in between formal studies and work. Anouk at the time was finishing her PhD in Montreal, both were interested in wine although not professionally, they had different feelings about it, he had more like a European approach and hers was more like North-American, meaning she's drink routinely wines from California, Chile and Argentina while he'd be rather focused on European wines when he'd buy bottles at the SAQ [the retailer and import monopoly in Quebec].
Paul admits that unlike what you find in France wines in Canada come from all over the world and he liked for example the Italian wines he bougt there. Paul at the time took part to private tasting events organized by Allan Laforest with lots of different wines, he went there with Anouk and they were exposed there to biodynamic wines. Paul says that in these early 2000 years (he hadn't heard about biodynamy before) he felt that something was different in these biodynamic wines, and that was something he definitely liked, there were vibes he'd not find in other wines. So both of them dug on the issue and ultimately found about natural wines, which have become widely available in Quebec thanks to a myriad of private importers.
Anouk completed her doctorate in 2011 and stated that she didn't want anymore to work in research, Paul wasn't himself very happy with some aspects of this job and they decided to try make wine themselves instead of waiting retirement for that like they used to say. Paul had found a scholarship on Erasmus, Vinifera (watch comments of Vinifera students in English here) where students from all over can study viticulture and winemaking in Europe. They had looked around to study in the United States or Australia but such scholarships are very expensive and France or Europe was clearly the best place to study and for the lowest costs. Both applied for the scholarship and to their surprise, both of them were accepted (there were more than 300 candidates and they took only 30 in), so it was a big chance to do the program together and they decided to go. They did two years of research-oriented master, which was good for them given their backgrounds, ity allowed them to bridge their former life with their new one in wine, spending the 1st year at SupAgro in Montpellier and the 2nd in the wine school of Turin (they were staying in Alba and Asti) ending this experience with a traineeship at Cerrato, a large-surface biodynamic domaine.
After this scholarship they had decided to find some work but they didn't find anything in France and they decided to head to Canada's Okanagan region as a former Vinifera student had tipped them about work opportunities there. Okanagan is a thriving wine region in the dry inland part of British Columbia. They contacted a winemaker over there, a French woman who was working in a 20-hectare domaine which also purchased grapês around. Duriing a year they learned to prune, do the debudding and other vineyard jobs, things that they hadn't trained for at the school on France and Italy. They liked it much over there with the lakes and mountains around, but this is a different viticulture with for example the irrigation. They still thought about finding vineyards there and begin something, Paul has his residency papers for Canada and that was doable, but loking closer they saw that the real estate reach astronomical prices for vineyards, like if he remembered well, 250 000 $ for one hectare (2,47 acres), and on top of that you have to count the irrigation costs. The other thing of course is that irrigated vineyards don't make terroir-driven wines, so they turned back to where land is still pretty cheap and terroir opportunities very varied, France or Italy which they liked very much too. They tried to work in Italy but Anouk had a work visa for france but not for Italy, so they focused on France and as it was late in the season the only place they found in the urgency was Chateau Palmer in Medoc (all the small family domaines had their team already complete). They started to work in mid-april 2016 and stayed there 3 or 4 months, this was very interesting, they were doing a super good work in the vineyard like all these high-end domaines now do (for example for their pruning they used the Guyot-Poussard method which focuses on the sap flux), and they also got their first experiences in biodynamic management there.
Anouk adds that France is also where many of the wines they liked were made, Okanagan like much of the New World is a region where wines are very technological and marketing-driven, using all the modern tools of enology. Whatever, at the time they had in between been contacted by Mark Angeli, the pioneer of natural wine who enthusiastically lobbied for them to come in his region of Anjou where you had these two priceless parameters, cheap land and great terroirs. So they moved to Anjou to do the harvest at Mark Angeli and they setlled in the area with in mind the prospect to find a couple of parcels. They stayed almost a year there and every week would take part to a tasting excercize with Mark where he opened randomly 5 or 6 bottles given to him at the Greniers Saint Jean, a natural wine-tasting event he oversees every year in Angers. One day he popped up a bottle of Bruno Allion, which they liked very much. And a few weeks later they heard that Bruno was going to retire and was looking for buyers. They emailed him they were interested and wanted to meet him, Bruno answered I wait for you, but they hadn't his phone number and when they drove there all the way from Anjou he wasn't home, they came a 2nd time, found him but leant other people were in line and they were in 3rd, then for different reasons the 1st candidates gave way and they ended up getting the chance to take over half of his surface. THey had been very favorably impressed by his vineyards when they visited, they liked the ambiance there as well as the spirit of forestry that Bruno had brought in by planting fruit trees back in the parcels like it used to be in the past
Anouk and Paul share the vintage straddle tractor of Bruno with the other guy who himself took over the other half of Bruno Allion's vineyards. The owner
of the other half, Bert, is Dutch and he took 6 hectares while they took 5. The problem is
that given the fact that their respective parcels face the same weather issues, they often need the tractor at the same time, and Anouk and Paul consider finding one of their own in the future. This shouldn't be hard to find, look at the second-hand straddle tractors for sale on this page, some are incredibly cheap, and still in running condition. I love this one although it's not the cheapest, never seen a tractor like this one, so cute, looks like a wading bird....
In the future, they plan to use a horse for the soil work and they chose to get in the split of vineyards, parcels that would form a single block, which makes it much easier for the management of a draft horse. They have Sauvignon, Gamay, Pineau d'Aunis and Romorantin, plus Côt on the slopes. They'd have liked to have the young Côt too but they had to let also Bert have his surface.
Anouk and Paul-André filled the press with the boxes of Pineau D'Aunis brought to the chai by successive round trip with the Niva or
the white van borrowed to one of the pickers. Like you can
guess, this direct press
will be for a rosé of Pineau D'Aunis, I ask them (a little anxious because for me there's nothing bettyer than a red Pineau d'Aunis) if they keep enough grapes on the vines for the red version, they say yes, and if I remember there'll be even more...
Paul-André says that this press can hold 70 boxes of grapes, more or less, and they direct the growers to stay in this limit so that there are not too much fruit picked. The picking should be finished this morning for the press part, and in the afternoon they'll pick the Pineau d'Aunis for the red, Anouk and Paul-André destemming the grapes outside the chai before the maceration. The pickers will for another grower the follwing day, there's a good coordination here to keep them busy as much as possible. Anouk and Paul are now familar with the chai even if sometimes (picture on right, i like these blank moments) they pause to decide on something important.
The juice begins to drop beneath the press with the weight of the grapes and the foot stomping of Anouk who makes sure that there'll be enough room for the planned 70 boxes. They left the 6 pickers in the parcel but Paul drives there soon after and wxill help them pick himself. They have a 30-are surface of Pineau d'Aunis, and approximatively the same surface of Romorantin. I correct something here, they'll make rosé of this press load, but more precisely this will be pet'nat, so a natural sparkling, good move.
Asked about how they'll vinify the red, Anouk says that they'll destemm 5/6 of the bunches, alternating a box of whole-clustered grapes here and there. tHey leave them macerate one week with occasionnal pigeage with the feet and when almost dry (sugar finished) they rack, press and blend the two juices before putting them in 350- and 225-liter barrels. That's more or less the way Bruno Allion made the wines, they like his wines and see no need to change the vinification, even if along the years there'll be certainly some changes of their own. Anouk as a young mother still works most of the day here with Paul-André, she'll just have to be back home at 5pm when the nanny finishes her shift, and it will be time to feed her baby girl...
Paul-André grabs a glass to taste the freshly pressed juice, more like free run juice actually, the pressing hasn't begun if for the foot stomping. That's delicious as you can guess, but it's always delicious and velvety in the juice stage,
hard to predict anything about the wine, for me at least. I love the orange color too. Unlike what people call in the region bernache (and vin nouveau in Alsace) there's
not a hint of alcohol here, it's plain juice, and a very healthy juice for one, no residues to be feared.
Like you saw in the vineyard there was a nice load of grapes on the vines in spite of mildew, and it seems that all around the yields have been up this year, possibly as a natural reaction of the vines after 2017 where the yields were low (caused by frost if I remember). Paul-André says that the conventional growers also have huge loads, sometimes 100 hectoliters/hectare or more and they'll be obliged to dump part of the harvest to remain below the maximum ceiling of the Appellation which is 60 [but the vines will still have worked for 100 ho/ha +, nixing any qualitative claims that are supposed to be the Appellation's raison d'être]. Surprisingly, Paul-André says, in spite of the generous yields there's a nice maturity and the sugar level is good too, he says this vintage is exceptional in this regard, and will be remembered as such.
Anouk toured me around in the cellar, here it's a barrel room with several barrels waiting for their juice/wine. They bought barrels from a large Maison in Burgundy (Maison Albert Bichot) for their whites and reds, in both 225-liter and 350-liter capacity and other barrels for the reds, 225-liter volumes from Chateau Palmer. The Sauvignon wines are already sitting in the
cellar in 350-liter demi-muids.
I asked Anouk if she travels back to Quebec from time to time to see her family and friends, but she says she hasn't travelled there since Christmas 2016, this was quite a while. She says they don't know yet when they'll be able to go there, and there's the young baby girl too... I ask about the situation for natural wine in Quebec, which I'm aware is pretty good with all these private importeurs who offer an alternative to the SAQ, and she says they'll have their wines imported in Quebec through Pot de Vin. These are cuvées that were vinified actually by Bruno Allion but both of them took part also and their names are also printed on the labels.
By the way, they'll have their own labels designed by Claire Marsauche, the daughte of Catherine Roussel of former Clos Roche Blanche (I met her several times but the best pic I found was this one shot by Jim Budd as she was picking at Clos Roche Blanche). Claire is an illustrator and she lives in Nantes if I'm right. If you're interested for having a label designed by here, here is her email : claire_marsauche [at] hotmail.fr . Claire is also working on natural ink for her future labels, like onion extracts, or using the red leaves of Côt to make ink. they saw the initial work and this is beautiful, but for now they don't know how it stands time, she's checking that before printing large scale.
We walked to another cellar tunnel, they're all connected, that's always a wonder for me to discover (or rediscover like here, I already knew these cellars with Bruno) such cellars dug in the sandstone of the hills, they're always different. Here you can see or guess on the left one of these fermenters embedded in the rock which elders used for their wines, you could get inside with a ladder, do your pigeage like in any open-top wooden fermenter, it was just cheaper in the long run and virtually indestructible. They're certainly made partly of cement, but like a troglodytic house they're sitting half against the rock and half outside, very good for the temperature inertia too.
The tunnel gallery here holds the barrels of Sauvignon, lined on the right and left.
I ask about the cellar if it's not too cold in winter, Anouk (who's been around since 2017 to work with Bruno) says it's always between 12 C and 14 C (53,6 - 57,2 F), and they take refuge there in winter as well in summer from both the freezing cold and the heat.
There's also another cellar room where they stock pallets of wines, both the 2017 they made with Bruno and other cuvées of Bruno which they bought with the business. Here some of the Sauvignon in barrels comes from the parcel named La Cabane, and half has its élevage in oak, half in neutral tanks (5 hectoliters each), and they'll see later if they blend the two, they'll probably but want to check first. they also have separately (they vinify the terroirs apart) the Sauvignon from La Grande Pièce, a terroir on the plateau. There's also Sauvignon from Le Poiras (wasn't not sure of the spelling, but that's chalked on the barrels), a parcel on the slope.
Anouk grabs a wine thief so that we can taste a Sauvignon 2018. Sauvignon was the first to be picked (harvest began in the very last days of august), it had been 3 weeks in these barrels when I visited. No batonnage, no stirring, they leave it quiet.
Very vivid, enjoyable young wine in its baby stage. This is a Sauvignon made from the lieu-dit La Grande Pièce, with a 350-liter barrel.
Next we tasted another barrel, a Sauvignon from the lieu-dit Le Poiras, which she says is more aromatic in pite of the more generous yields of this vintage. These coteaux (slopes) are gorgeous she says, they understood immediately that the parcel had to be vinified separately, that's one of the high point of their first visit at Bruno Allion, when they were considering settling here. Even when they pruned they saw that the vines are beautiful, harmoniously balanced, and later in the season the grapes were perfect too, no need to sort out the grapes, very healthy conditions. In spite of mildew, this vintage is incredible, almost magic, she says. And earlier in the season they had no clue it would turn so nice, in may as she was on maternity leave there was this mildew attack, everybody was rushing to spray almost every week, this made a lot of stress especialy for them on this first vintage. This 2nd Sauvignon is sweeter at this stage, very enjoyable indeed.
__ Romorantin ! Anouk had me also taste another white from the barrel, the Romorantin. The color here is more yellowish, very turbid. Anouk says that in the tank the juice looked like a giant espresso because even the foam was brownish, it was gorgeous, it smelled candied apricot. The color quietly came back to yellow tones since. Very nice, vivid, and beyonf the sweetness you feel the sharper type of wine which it'll yield in the future when it'll be dry. Anouk says that it fermented rather quickly, and the other went
through well this year as well. They have two 350-lite barrels of Romorantin, plus a small tank, which they'l use partly to top up. The vines are in their 4th year, they grow on a slope and the parcel makes 30 ares (0,3 hectare) in total.
Here on the picture above we are in the cellar tunnel for the reds in which we went thereafter (each of these cellars are connected with passageways), they got the barrels from Chateau palmer, the biodynamic domaine in Médoc, these barrels are two-wine old, meaning 4 years as Palmer used them 2 years for each vintage. They got also 350-liter barrels from Albert Bichot in Burgundy, which look barely bigger than a normal 225-liter. These barrels which dated from 2012 & 2013 were in super conditions when they were delivered here. Anouk says that the good side also is that they're still easy to move around, compared even to a 400-liter. They'll keep their barrels of any size as long as they can, they'll not rotate, they don't look for new oak.
__ Gamay, in a 350-liter barrel since the previous day. Was picked around the 2nd week of september. Very nice, here you already feel the finished wine, very young of course but already with the qualities of a grown wine. Pretty impressive, and all that done through wild yeast. You just need to wait here but I can't wait to drink this in a year from now. Here the vines are 50 years old, they were planted by Bruno's father.
__ We taste the same Gamay from a 225-liter barrel from Chateau Palmer. I feel this 2nd Gamay like being more sappy, I like that.
__ We taste another Gamay, the one from 2017 which is still in barrels (these ones are looking older because of the mold. Anouk says that the mold grows quickly in
here and they have to keep the barrels clean regularly. They made this wine with Bruno Allion
and they'll bottle this wine
with their own labels designed by Claire. This Gamay has a nice fruity expression, either like morello cherries or small red fruits. Feels generous in the mouth, makes about 13 % in alcohol. Was made from La Grande Pièce.
__ Lastly we tast the Côt which is in a fiber-plastic tank, it was made from the parcel la Maison Neuve, the one pictured on top with Bruno Allion in the foreground on my story posted in 2015, a magnificent parcel, Anouk says. This Côt looks fantastic, just look at its color in the plastic jug on left, gorgeous ! Anouk says they just did 3 pigeages (pushdown on the cap), she says it's so intense... The Côt was picked the previous week, using the same ration, 5/6 with a box of whole-clustered grapes laying inbetween 5 boxes of destemmed grapes. They had to take out some juice because with te fermentation the tank was overflowing. They'll have about 30 hectoliters of Côt. Tastes very good, very onctuous, delicious and fruity, my bet is you better don't miss this one when it'll be ready. It will spend a year in barrels, both frolm Bichot and Palmer, they'll also compare at the end how the wine behaves respectively in the 350-liter and the 225-liter.
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