2018 Saumur Champigny Les Terres Rouges

Full bottle 1,324 g. Certified Ecocert organic. Antoine’s newest wine, first produced in 2016, from one tiny parcel of young Cabernet Franc vines. Antoine spotted the difference in the site and produces a wine quite distinct from the others due to the soil. The harvest is picked by hand into small crates and carefully sorted upon entry to the cellar. The fruit is only 50% de-stemmed with 50% left whole bunch and moved to concrete vat mechanically without any pumping over. Spontaneous fermentation and without any additives other than a minimal dose of sulphites at the start of fermentation with a maceration of around 30 days. Then the wine is aged for 12 months in concrete tank. It’s bottled unfined and unfiltered. Such a cool nose it's essence of glacial river through alpine forest – one gulp of the aromatics in this wine and I can hear rushing water in my ears, feel the cold coming off fern-brushed moss-green rocks. It's crushed red apples and tarragon leaves and tomato vine and fresh potato peelings and cloves soaked in water and samphire. The tannins are a little more rugged than its stablemates, a little smoky-throat guttural, but they still purr. There's a stillness to this wine that reminds me of a poker player, giving nothing away, waiting, reading your face like a hand reads braille, every fibre tensed to the slightest movement. I found myself holding my breath as I tasted it. (TC)