2011 Sancerre Monts Damnes

The Francois Cotat 2011 Sancerre Les Monts Damnes went entirely dry, with 14.5% alcohol recognizable primarily in sheer volume conveyed on a polished, richly lees-endowed palate, but also in a bit of finishing heat. Scents – and thereafter, bitter-sweetly pungent palate presence – of coriander, cardamom, caraway and sage, are allied to succulent Persian melon and lightly cooked apple. There is a faint suggestion of sweetness, reportedly a function of the alcohol and fruit personality rather than above-threshold residual sugar. This finishes with impressive persistence, even if – as already noted – with a touch of heat. It is another Cotat wine of its vintage whose evolution I would be very curious to follow, but for which I am not prepared to predict the sort of long life-span that one normally associates with wines from this address. Given Francois Cotat’s (and before that, his father’s and uncle’s) penchant for late picking and the promoting of textural richness in sweetly ripe Sancerre, 2010 seemed destined to prove an ideal match for this estate, which began harvesting at the end of the first week in October, but did not finish until nearly month’s end. In the event, the wines that resulted are so diverse – in part extreme, even by estate standards – that generalization is fatuous. Cotat’s 2011s are good for some surprises too, again for being so different from one another, but also in how little marked one of their number is by the ripe manifestations of citrus and pit fruits one practically takes for granted at this address. After the 2010 vintage, Francois Cotat with regret pulled out the considerable expanse of impossibly unproductive 65-year-old vines that his grandfather had planted and that had in recent years contributed around 30% by volume to the Grande Cote bottling. But that still leaves vines of around 45 years average, and on their first appearance without their 65 year old elders, that team turned in a memorable 2011 performance. A Peter Vezan Selection (various importers), Paris; fax 011 33 1 42 55 42 93