Day 4, after all the tasting so far, today would at prove the end turn out to be the most weird.
Our first stop was in Vouvray at Bernard Fouquet. They only do Chenin Blanc wines but have various styles. The first wine was the Cuvee Silex, a dry but tasting off dry, rounded, soft feeling wine with aromas of stone fruit, melon with cane through on the taste. Beautifully east to drink.
Bernard Fouquet caves
The second wine was the the Le Petit Clos 2017, dryer and with green notes of grass and apple but with subtle aromas of lemon, peach and melon. We tried the 2016 version which has an oakey note on the nose and the same green flavours.
Le Marigny (dry) was next. Dryer still and Oak aromas and flavours of lemon and green apple.
Le Marigny (sweet) has 30g of residual sugar. Honey, citrus aromas and flavours.
Le Plan De Jean 2018 is a late harvest wine and has 70g of residual sugar. Able to be stored for 20 years or more. Soft, smooth with honey and peach aromas and flavours and slight citrus notes in the background. The 2015 version was aged in barrels and has aromas of oak and a faint hint of kerosene but not in the taste.
Cuvee Alexandre is a desert wine with aging ability of 50 year’s, why? Amazing aromas of honey, dried apricots. Very sweet with honey, orange marmalade and raisin flavours, wonderful, superb it makes life worth living.
The last tasting was the sparkling wine Brut, to help clean the palette. Not sure if it would be better to start with this but there are aromas and flavours of citrus, clean but possibly influencer by the sweet wine still.
The last sparkling was the Cuvee Zero. Aromas of warm bread and citrus flavours, very nice, I liked the clearness on the palette.
Bernard Fouquet, Vouvray, Loire Valley
Francois et Julien Pinon in Vouvray was the next stop. We tasted in a troglodyte cave house, cool and inviting.
Francois Pinons storage
Francois Pinons tasting room
The Brut had aromas of lemon with fresh mineral notes. The flavours were subtle, more citrus and green, very dry with high acidity.
The Zero Brut had more yeasty notes with a little hint of petroleum. There are flavours of citrus and green apple.
The Sec 2018 still white is made of Chenin Blanc. It has aromas of lemon and hints of grapefruit. There are flavours of citrus but also a creamy texture.
The next white was from grapes grown on limestone rather than clay. This has more floral notes and a slightly rounded although with good acidity. Both are drink all day wines and good value at under Eur14 a bottle.
The next stop was the weirdest, strangest and some would say the most bonkers.
Making wine in clay and concrete pots 800m inside a cave.
David Sebastien, Loire Valley wine making in a cave
All the wines that he made were competent, the reds had an earthy smell but were full-bodied Cab Franc and had very subtle differences but with good red fruit and black fruit flavours coming through.
The idea is that the wine will take on the flavours of the pot and the pot will breakdown the tanning and structures of wine to give it a finer flavour. He toasts the inside of the pots to give different flavours just as you would a barrel. He even hangs some from the caves ceiling.
The hanging wine vat
Humidity is at 85% and the temperature is approximately 12 degrees in the caves, theres masses of mould growing on the walls on tanks barrels, spooky place.
Mould growing on the barrels
The guy can make wine but I’m not entirely convinced that this is the way forward.
