Pollux Membership January 2023: Can I Get A Witness and Harvesting the Holly

Villa Diamante’s own charmingly drawn vineyard map, indicating the plot of Fiano di Avellino used in the “Vigna della Congregazione”.

“Can I Get A Witness”

Fiano di Avellino Riserva “Vigna della Congregazione”, Villa Diamante 2019

Although I no longer consider myself religious in the organized sense, I grew up fairly involved in church, and I’ve found that, oddly enough, it’s been incredibly useful as a wine professional. For one, the anthropological aspects of European wine are littered with ecclesiastical influences, from the choice of sites to the naming of vineyards to the time and financial resources required to advance a myriad of winemaking techniques, from barrel aging to the advent of sparkling wine. Of course, the legacy of the Catholic church in wine is more complicated than that, and I will gratefully avoid a Bacchanal Holy War and stay in my lane as your humble sommelier. Perhaps the correct word to choose is legacy-something that is left behind, passed down through time. When visiting wine regions, very often the influence of religion is felt deeply-these are smaller, often rural areas, with tight-knit communities that dedicate a high portion of their populations to the wine industry. The heavy dependence on their land and nature’s good graces leads to a fundamental need for belief in something that you can’t necessarily see or control; indeed, many of these regions have detailed rituals, traditions, celebrations, and festivals that are designed to honor or give thanks for their bounty each season. Regardless of how you feel about the presence or meaning of religion in the modern world, there is a decidedly spiritual element to wine, a feeling that is palpable for me each and every time I step into a vineyard, or commune with a group of people dedicated to making something pleasurable with the resources they have and passing on both their mission and the literal fruits of their labor-an enviable legacy, to be sure. January’s Pollux White wine tells the story of a legacy both evangelical and familial: a historical vineyard site owned by the church and meant for its people, the man who recognized and became a zealot for this land, and the two women who continued and advanced his legacy upon dealing with his untimely loss.

Fiano on the vine.

East of the city of Naples, the region of Campania’s production of wine predates Christianity-Pliny the Elder even wrote about the highly coveted bottlings being a sensation in ancient Rome. The red grape Aglianico competes for the title of biggest Italian red in terms of structure, and white varietals such as Greco make refreshing, melon-scented quaffables that are ideal for an afternoon on the Mediterranean. For my palate, however, the Campanian varietal capable of producing the most complexity and the strictest expression of its terroir is the white Fiano which, like Greco, is cultivated primarily in the hilly province of Avellino. A medium-bodied white grape, Fiano at its best strikes a balance between deftly capturing the high-elevation mineral soil and an ethereal level of structure and aromatics. Like many regions in mid-to-late 20th century Italy, Campania was dominated by co-ops (and not the quality-minded kind that I discuss in this month’s Castor feature); even into the 1990s, Fiano di Avellino examples available in the US were either grocery store fodder, anonymous large production offerings, or both. Thankfully, the artisanal bent of estate bottling soon found its way to these lush hillsides, and one pioneer of estate-grown, organic Fiano was a returning prodigal son: Antoine Gaita, who spent his childhood in Belgium after his father, from the Avellino area, had immigrated there to work. Antoine developed a passion for wine and as he grew into adulthood felt a calling to return to a homeland that he barely knew. He married a New Jersey native whose family also had immigrated from Campania and upon returning to the small village of Montefredane, Antoine named his newly founded property after her: Diamante. Established in 1996, Antoine worked with vineyards that had been planted originally in the early 1980s on historic land, parcels of which had once been owned by the Catholic Church and used for the benefit of the local parishioners. The plantings are uniquely northerly facing and encourage the grapes to ripen slowly and evenly in the southern Italian sun. Antoine’s use of yeasts derived from his vineyards, organic methods employed both in the rows and cellar, and bottling without fining or filtration gave him a deserved reputation for pioneering small-production, terroir-specific Fiano, particularly from the small plot near his house that was used for his Fiano Riserva; in a nod to the vineyard’s past history, he named the reserve bottling “Vigna della Congregazione”.

Diamante and Serena Gaita, standing in the vineyards near their home.

Faith, to whatever we direct its placement, is vital to our human experience. Antoine and Diamante, ardent witnesses for the wines of their ancestral land, had by all accounts been joined at the hip since they first met in 1976. In 2015, Antoine fell ill with a seemingly innocuous sickness that tragically progressed quickly and led to his untimely passing. Devastated but determined to carry on her husband’s vision, Diamante at first hired a consulting enologist and continued to produce Villa Diamante’s wines. In a few years, Antoine and Diamante’s daughter Serena, still very young, decided to, in her words, “get her hands and boots dirty”-she began winemaking studies and entered the vineyards of her family to continue the legacy of her parents. Today, Serena is a fiercely talented winemaker, partnering with her mother Diamante, who watches over the other aspects of the estate. They are a true dynamic duo, evident from your first sip of the stunning “Vigna della Congregazione”. As we begin a new year, telling stories such as Diamante and Serena’s, in the often chaotic and commercialized business that I have chosen, help to restore my own faith; each bottle from their tiny production is truly a small piece of their family’s ongoing legacy-D.

Villa Diamante Fiano di Avellino Riserva “Vigna della Congregazione” 2019

Country of Origin: Italy.

Places and People: Villa Diamante was created in 1996 by husband and wife Antoine and Diamante Gaita; both were first-generation immigrants elsewhere (Belgium for Antoine, New Jersey for Diamante) whose families had come from this very area. Upon his return to the Avellino province and the small commune of Montefredane, Antoine became a pioneer in site-specific, terroir driven Fiano, which he perfected with ever-increasing levels of quality until his untimely passing in 2015. Devastated but determined, Diamante continued the winery her husband named for her, hiring a consulting enologist until their daughter Serena, still very young, decided to take up her father’s trade. Now a dynamic young winemaker, Serena crafts the wines while her mother handles the estate-these two powerhouse females continue to build upon Antoine’s legacy. The Fiano vines that yield “Vigna della Congregazione” are located just behind the family home, at an altitude of 430 meters. The vineyards face northerly, a key departure from most of their neighbors and the ultimate factor in the Fiano’s steady, even ripening. A scant production of just 550 cases makes this wine a rare treat.

Soil: Clay and Calcaire.

Grape Varieties: 100% Fiano.

Winemaking: A manual harvest of the small vineyard area of just 3 hectares is transported immediately to the winery, where the must is immediately pressed (whole cluster fermentation is employed). Depending upon the vintage/weather conditions, either wild native yeasts or a yeast culture is used to start fermentation, however, the cultures are drawn from the estate directly rather than being purchased. Temperature-controlled fermentation takes place in stainless steel, and the vinification process lasts 25-30 days, a remarkable figure for the region and one which contributes to the amazing complexity found on the palate.

Aging: The Vigna della Congregazione is aged for 11 months in those same stainless steel tanks, with constant supervision but minimal intervention only when necessary. The wine is then bottled, unfined and unfiltered, and aged for an additional 8 months prior to release.

Flavors and Foods: A revelation-the 2019 Vigna della Congregazione is Fiano for the Thinking Person; a subtle yet intoxicating blend of aromatics and acidity that has you pulling new descriptors from the glass with each sip. Base fruits of ripe melon, lemon confit, and fresh yellow apple mingle with delicate white flowers, whose presence is thankfully felt on the nose more so than the palate. Structurally the Congregazione is full-bodied, with a round mouthfeel that really touches every corner of your palate. Textural raciness (a little bit of spritz) drives the wine along the palate towards a lingering and satisfying finish, and the higher-elevation soil manifests itself in a decidedly mineral note of high-toned wet rock, and there are notes of smokiness and fresh almond as well-as I said, this wine is complex. Fresh seafood dishes would be an ideal compliment (branzino accompanied by arugula with grated Parmesan), but shellfish (given the acidity) and white meat (grilled chicken, given the weight) are great possibilities. The Vigna della Congregazione would also be excellent paired with hard, tangy cheeses, but truthfully, given all of the complexity and cerebral nature of this wine, my favorite pairing with Congregazione is a good friend and some great conversation.

Service and Cellar: Villa Diamante’s wines have always had great capacity to age, and the 2019 Vigna della Congregazione is no exception: Serena has harnessed and built upon her father Antoine’s structural sturdiness; the 2019 will be excellent beyond its 10th birthday. Serve on the lower end of white wine cellar temperature (48 degrees F); this keeps the spritzy texture and youthful acidity in check.

The town of Sancerre, viewed from hilltop vineyard sites between Menetou-Ratel and Amigny.

“Harvesting the Holly”

Domaine Fleuriet Sancerre Rouge “Anthocyane”, Loire Valley, France 2016 and 2018

Sometimes life on the road during a wine buying trip can take on a bit of a surreal quality; you often find yourself ensconced in little moments that have you thinking, “Yep, I’m here, and this is happening. Okaaaaayyyy…” My visit three years ago to the Loire Valley and the producer I was representing, Bernard Fleuriet et Fils in Sancerre, was particularly memorable for stringing together roughly 1.6 million of those tiny moments over a three-day period (but who’s counting), many of them unique to this particular visit because we arrived during the annual Feast of St. Vincent, held at the end of January each year in most major wine regions of France. Celebrating the previous year’s harvest and paying homage to the patron saint of wine, St. Vincent events can vary by region, from the more grandiose display of marching and a pig roast for (at least) hundreds in Burgundy (the St. Vincent festivities were revived in the early 20th century by the Burgundy-based wine fraternity, the Confrerie des Chevaliers du Tastevin) to the more community-oriented celebrations Vinifrance Imports President Olivier Daubresse and I experienced in the Fleuriet family’s home village of Menetou-Ratel.

Founded originally as a farm cultivating grains and cereals, the Fleuriet estate, called La Vauvise, remains agricultural in nature, but in 1992 Bernard Fleuriet added winery to his family’s list of occupations. Excellent critical reception and increased holdings led both of Bernard’s sons, Mathieu and Benoit, to join as they came of age, with Mathieu concentrating on cellar work and vinification while Benoit excels chiefly in the vineyards themselves. I had met Mathieu and Benoit the previous year when they came to the States to work on the market with me showing their various cuvees, wines which have a consistent excellence due to Benoit’s meticulous nature as a farmer and Mathieu’s skills in the cellar, where his exacting demands on his family’s facilities (their new winery is state of the art and a case study in how to harvest, press, and transfer juice to fermenting and aging vessels without exposing it to oxygen) and his skill as a blender are most welcome. When they visited us in DC and Virginia, I imposed a fairly rigorous calendar of tasting appointments and sales calls that had these lovers of the Loire Valley way of life begging for a meal by the conclusion of each day, a fact that they humorously nagged me for and which I tried to explain away as the pace of the American workday, but the truth is every single one of my clients wanted to see the brothers and learn how they were able to make such excellent Sauvignon Blanc and Pinot Noir (Sancerre Rouge is 99.9% of the time made from the sublimely fickle grape).

Naturally, when we arrived in the Sancerre region Mathieu instructed us to meet him and Benoit in the town of Sancerre itself, perched over the Loire River, for-what else-lunch. The brothers were jokingly adamant; they were going to transform this “run, run, run” American guy into a “still works hard but lunch with 4 bottles of wine constitutes as hard work also where we live” temporary Loire resident. After lunch, Mathieu took us to the La Vauvise estate and we saw the aforementioned winery while Benoit left to check on a few matters in the vineyards. Tasting tank and barrel samples of their lineup reaffirmed what we knew from back home: the Fleuriets were making high-quality, intellectually stimulating wines that had the added side benefit of oozing deliciousness from every side of each respective glass.

We geeked out a little longer on the different subzones and terroirs of Sancerre and what fermenting/aging vessels were used for each cuvee, both red and white, before departing in the returning Benoit’s dusty SUV for an early evening tour of several vineyard sites, where we admired the appellation under the fading January sun and practiced a little vine pruning with one of Benoit’s assistants. Sidebar: a curiosity that I have often seen in practice while traveling is that invariably a vineyard or subzone that is highly thought of at home, when seen in person, does not harbor anywhere near the enthusiasm that the wine is given in our local market, and we saw this in fascinating detail touring these westerly vineyards of Sancerre with Benoit, as several plots that I had been taught to revere over my time in DC showed surprisingly substandard aspect and elevation, and while I’m not in the business of tattling on other producers, it made my love for the Fleuriet wines make all the more sense.

On the way home Benoit wanted to take us to see another producers’ cellar and experience a different interpretation of Sancerre (“little moment” alert), so he chatted on his mobile until his eyes grew big with excitement and turned to us asking if we wanted to meet the renowned Sancerre maverick, Pascal Cotat. Famous for producing extraordinarily long-lived, biodynamically principled wines that in many cases barely resemble what most consumers would consider Sauvignon Blanc, but glow with their own ethereal light all the same, Pascal Cotat’s cellar was a revelation. I hope to one day feature his wines with my GWC members and hence will leave the details of my visit for another time, but suffice to say we tasted Sancerre Blanc from 1978 that was still somehow virbrantly alive, and I nearly left my rear end in his cellar, frozen to the wooden bench inside a stone enclave almost two stories underground that passed for Pascal’s tasting room.

Upon arriving back at La Vauvise, Mathieu had arranged for some pizza to be brought into the winery’s tasting room and bar and we enjoyed a casual dinner and nightcap in preparation for the St. Vincent festivities to come over the next two days. Joining us were a trio of Eastern European businessmen who were trying to buy some tractors from Benoit and Mathieu; they had a decidedly shifty nature to them, and didn’t speak any French, but one of them spoke English so Olivier and I found ourselves involved in the middle of some prizeworthy haggling serving as translators; Olivier was slightly perturbed at being thrust into action in this way, but in my “little moments” state of mind, this was a great time, chugging slices of “Rome by way of Loire” pizza al taglio and discovering that tractors are, in fact, ridiculously expensive. The whole thing felt like some sort of French twist on a Guy Ritchie film, and as we settled into the one-bedroom farmhouse apartment that would be our quarters for our stay (Olivier graciously gave me the bedroom and took the sleeper sofa in the living area), I was leaning into the unknown talismanic pleasures of travel.

Wooden figurines on my brisk morning walk from our farmhouse to the Fleuriet estate of La Vauvise.

Having the only bedroom came with one drawback: the chicken coop. I was backed up to the rear of the property we were crashing at, and my morning came a little earlier than someone who’d been on the road for a week would have liked, as the roosters right outside my window trumpeted the winter daybreak. Travel (and perhaps more likely the pizza, too heavy for his haute cuisine constitution) had caught up to Olivier, as well: when I emerged from the bedroom he was down and out with a cold/upset stomach and told me he’d meet up with me at lunch. Benoit called and offered me a ride to La Vauvise and breakfast; the brothers wanted me to join them on the village winemaker’s St. Vincent Festival preparations that morning. Feeling my oats (an apt expression given that vast tracts of them were cultivated right beside the lonely country road leading to La Vauvise), I declined the ride and took a chilly but invigorating walk about a mile or so to the Fleuriet estate, experiencing a pastoral silence (and yet another “little moment”) that is all too rare in our lives here in the DMV. Arriving at the main house, Benoit apologized that he had to run his son to school, and would I please have a coffee and croissant with his father?

Turning into the tiny but well-stocked farmhouse kitchen, I encountered Bernard Fleuriet, the family patriarch. Benoit told him that I could speak French but that he’d have to take it slowly, to which Bernard nodded, perhaps not concerned, as his speech was the gentile declension of an older man entirely satisfied with coffee and conversation. Upon accepting Bernard’s offer of coffee, I was “little-momented” by his presentation to me of a standard-size cereal bowl, filled to the brim with a hot, chicory-laden beverage that may have been the best coffee I’ve ever had, and which started me (heretofore not much of a coffee drinker at all but too polite in Europe to decline) down a road that has culminated with the erstwhile espresso habit I now harbor. We talked of current events; France was in the midst of experiencing the “yellow jacket” protests and disturbances, and some virus called Covid-19 had been discovered in China but was buried 5 pages deep in Bernard’s newspaper.

Benoit’s return to the kitchen meant a quick goodbye to Bernard and an even quicker ride from La Vauvise to the center of the Fleuriet’s tiny village, Menetou-Ratel, whose municipal math was quite simple-a few hundred people, one main street, one church, one village hall, and more winemakers (12 by my count) than traffic lights (zero). We went to the cellar of one of those dozen winemakers in the center of town, ostensibly to discuss preparing for St. Vincent: it was the men’s responsibility to go to the forest north of the village and obtain holly trees (evergreen, they are the symbol of this January festival) and bring them back to the churchyard, to be placed in front and decorated. My second round of coffee and conversation was spent in the background, listening to these men, all farmers whose collars were decidedly blue and equipped with varying levels of rascally charm. To my recollection, the 20-minute meeting consisted of two minutes of St. Vincent-related logistics (one of the winemakers, Jean-Jacques, owned some forested land where we would get the hollies) and 18 minutes of the men complaining about their wives, which in France is still even today a competitive sport. That was also to be the end of my coffee consumption; upon exiting the cellar and piling into various trucks and vans equipped with rudimentary trailers and banged-up beds with rusty liftgates, wine was the order of the day.

New vintages of white and rose harvested the previous fall were at the point where they could be shared and evaluated by this time, and the men did so in an ego-free, communal fashion that I don’t think has an equivalent in the US: we tried a just-bottled tank sample from a large and boisterous man named Regis right in the forest as a toast for our work in cutting and hauling the young holly trees, another at a winemaker named Jacques’ house (not Jean-Jacques, he’s a different…oh well you get the picture), which we enjoyed sitting around his dining room table when it was determined that his new home that none of the guys had seen yet, with its small pond in the rear, was right on the way between the forest and our return to the village. Jacques’ saintly and incredulous wife gawked just for an instant at the sight of 15 or so muddied neanderthals marching into her home, fresh scratches from tree branches and holly leaves adorning our faces, before dutifully disappearing into the kitchen and emerging with a fresh bottling of their own (another “little moment”, perhaps I should start abbreviating these?).

After this stopover it was back to the churchyard to stake the holly trees; I ask, “do we need to decorate them?” and am met with a round of laughter and the assurance that this task resides with the ladies and children. Then it’s off to the village restaurant (no need to name it, there is only one), where Olivier rejoins the group, having recovered from his indisposition only to be tasked with trying umpteen different new offerings from the rest of the group, all of whom have brought bottles to share, some more than one. After an extended lunch of the day’s special (again, the “menu” in winter is whatever they want to serve you), a boeuf bourguignon-esque stew, Mathieu Fleuriet arrives to whisk Olivier and I off on a late-afternoon errand: his friend Toni needs assistance in filtering his wines.

We jump into Mathieu’s truck, which in the bed houses a large mobile filtration system that looks like photos of the earliest supercomputers. Arriving at Toni’s “cellar”, which is little more than a barn, we set to work: Mathieu operating the settings on the filtration system with the speed of a savant, Toni racing to a wall full of hose fittings to find the proper ones to attach to his tanks of Sauvignon Blanc, Olivier and I lifting large hoses up ladders to the tops of the tanks and inserting them so that the juice can be collected and run to the filtration system, which passes the wine through and shoots it back into the tank with no oxygen touching. Three things are apparent as I watch this process: the Fleuriets have resources that no one else in their village possess, they are as unpretentious and generous with said resources as a family can possibly be, and the other vignerons don’t view these resources with the slightest trace of envy or ill will, only respect.

As we finish the filtration and have a quick Happy Hour sampling of Toni’s wines (he is strictly biodynamic in his practices and the wines have an appealing earthiness and subtlety about them), Benoit calls: we are due back at La Vauvise. On the eve of St. Vincent, multiple producers in each Sancerre AOP village open their cellar doors for tastings and fellowship, and then one winery in each commune is responsible for hosting the village at both a casual dinner the evening before and a more structured, larger meal on the day of the festival. Unsurprisingly, Domaine Fleuriet is the host this year for Mentou-Ratel, but first we head to Sancerre itself, where the host winery of Amigny, another nearby commune, has invited us to join them in Sancerre for their version of these walk-around cellar visits.

The cellars of Sancerre proper are both older and stuffier; at one larger producer of note the winemaker, dressed in a chic vest and jeans and looking more at home in Paris than here in the Loire, served us tank samples with a rather detached, assured air. Olivier and I raise our eyebrows: Toni’s humble yet authentic wines that we helped filter that afternoon are much more interesting, to say nothing of the genius of the Fleuriets. After a few more cellar visits we head back to Menetou-Ratel, where on the second floor of the building that houses the Fleuriet’s tasting room a reception is prepared. After all of the sampling of the day, even with spitting, I eye the mounds of bread and charcuterie ravenously. The display is so ornate and abundant I assume it’s our meal for the evening, and it is only an hour later as I’m on my 67th helping of salami and cheese that I realize they are also bringing out an actual DINNER. Olivier, who has held himself in check, enjoys the deliciously prepared lamb being served while smiling at my attempt to find room in my now-bulging stomach for a sliver of additional food out of sheer etiquette. We sample library vintages of the Fleuriet top flight Pinot Noir called “Anthocyane”, and I listen to the warm-hearted raucous humor of a group of people who have spent most of their lives together, sharing evenings like this.

Just before the church service on the day of St. Vincent-the winemakers from the village gather across the street from the church with the priests; our harvested hollies, the symbol of the Fete de St. Vincent, are now staked into the ground of the churchyard and surrounding area, and the ladies of the village have decorated them with flowers.

On the third day of our stay in Sancerre I am grateful for the rooster; after the whirlwind of events yesterday I don’t know if I would have gotten up otherwise. Olivier and I dress and drive ourselves to the village center, where the winemakers of Menetou-Ratel line up on one side of the street, with us ordinary citizens on the other. Our haul of holly trees ring the churchyard, staked into the ground and decorated with flowers and garland. The priests walk across from the church and offer a blessing to the winemakers and also to the barrel-topped staff carried by Jacques, as the symbol for continued prosperity of the vines. Traditional music is played courtesy of our friend Toni, he of the filtration expedition from the day before: this morning, Toni has traded his hose fittings for a hurdy-gurdy.

The priests lead the winemakers on a procession into the church, followed by what seems like the entire remainder of the village, plus a few visiting friends and colleagues. We pack the little chapel for a brief mass before heading off to the village hall for a short celebration of the new harvest; small tasting pours of the winemakers’ whites and roses from the 2019 vintage are arranged in dramatic circles on each table. After a few moments spent thanking the ladies for putting this all on, we excuse ourselves and head to Sancerre proper, where the Fleuriet family have another “little moment” in store for Olivier and I: they own a small fromagerie, specializing in goat cheeses local to the region (the main one, a golden rind gem named after Sancerre is delightful, especially aged 3 weeks and paired with a nip of its namesake), and we receive both a tour of the small aging room and a tasting, picking a few choice wheels to bring back to La Vauvise and serve as hors d’oeuvres.

The St. Vincent celebration (the official one, as opposed to the innumerable other parties documented above) is due to commence around 1pm; the front half of the winery has been cleared of work materials and tables have been set up on the concrete floor in a U shape, with large stainless-steel tanks as our backdrop. Mathieu has generously given Olivier and I the task of choosing wines for the party; we descend to a small cave below the winery where there is a room of limited library stacks, representing Domaine Fleuriet from its 1992 inception up to the present. We are told that the room is ours to pick from, and being a little curious (greedy?) about the older vintages of Anthocyane that date back to the early ‘90s, we set about preparing a lineup of mostly time-honored choices, all of which sing when they are served later at the party, paired with robust country cooking that is reminiscent of American barbeque sans overly spicy or sugary sauces. Prepared outside by a relative of Mathieu and Benoit’s mother, the food is delicious and the wines copious; Olivier and I sit across from a delightful German-born man who now lives in the forests south of Paris and comes to St. Vincent each year in the Loire. He describes enjoying these wines at his home, which sort of sounds like a royal hunting lodge; at probably 250 pounds and a few inches taller than me, the gentleman looks the part.

As afternoon turns to early evening the winemakers/wine pros in attendance start to escape the shenanigans; I have always found it surprising that most, if not all, wine professionals rarely let themselves lose control at these types of gatherings-it’s as if they don’t want to perpetuate any negative connotations of something they consider their way of life. Accordingly, at the sound of the first glass breaking on the concrete floor, Mathieu retreats into the interior of the winery and motions for us to join. Pulling some of his biodynamically produced, zero-sulfur cuvee of Sauvignon Blanc called “Pur” from its egg-shaped amphora for us, we toast once more to St. Vincent, and to all of the winemakers and vineyard workers in this tiny village of fewer than 500. The bracing acidity and tropical flavors of the “Pur” work like some restorative elixir, and upon exiting the winery I amazingly feel something akin to sobriety.

As Olivier and I depart for Paris early the next morning, after one more cereal bowl coffee (and my last “little moment”) with Bernard, the gentle father figure, I am left pondering the tour guide-ready phrase used to describe the Loire Valley: “Le Jardin de France (The Garden of France)”. With a litany of “little moments” under my belt, I am confident that what is being grown by the Fleuriet family is, perhaps, a little more than grains and grapevines-D.

Domaine Fleuriet Sancerre Rouge “Anthocyane”, Loire Valley 2016 and 2018

Country of Origin: France.

Location: The Fleuriet winery is located in the village of Menetou-Ratel, one of the communes covered by the Sancerre appellation-the family farm goes by the name La Vauvise, and the winery built to the rear of the original house is state of the art, with gravity-fed presses going directly to tanks and concrete eggs below. A tiny, close-knit village of mostly winemakers and their families, Menetou-Ratel is about a 10 minute drive northwest of the town of Sancerre itself. The vineyards for Anthocyane are all within the commune of Menetou-Ratel and comprise the oldest vines of Pinot Noir that the family owns.

Soil: The Anthocyane is produced solely on what the French call “Terres Blanches”, a calcareous clay with Kimmeridgian limestone.

Grape Varieties: 100% Pinot Noir

Winemaking: Manual harvesting at a low yield of 30hl/ha (almost half of the 59hl/ha that is legally allowed for pinot in the region), and a very long maceration period of 30 days, which is evident in the concentration of the wine.

Aging: The Anthocyane spends one year in high-quality French oak barriques, of which 50% are new with the remaining half having been used once before. Mathieu employs a variety of barrels, but the Anthocyane is best served (and, increasingly, mainly aged in) a local Loire cooper called La Croix.

Flavors and Foods (2018): I can’t express enough that while Anthocyane is a great wine measured in any metric, it is LIGHT YEARS above most other pinot noir from Sancerre in terms of both depth of flavor and structure. Deep bing cherry and raspberry on the attack, along with a gentle hint of vanilla and toast. A great through-characteristic of all Fleuriet’s Pinot Noirs for me is the distinct presence of secondary meaty characteristics, and the 2018 Anthocyane carries a great note of fresh cured Virginia ham in the mid-palate. Throw in a finish that is mellow (in keeping with the medium alcohol of the wine) and full of rose petal and violet, and you have a Pinot that is just beginning to reveal itself. Coq au Vin, a daube of beef, or a leaner bistro steak cut (flat-iron) are ideal pairings.

Flavors and Foods (2016): The oak barrel regimen for the 2016 vintage was made up of more flavorful, heavily toasted specimens, so the initial attack on both nose and palate is one of fresh baking spices, vanilla, and nutmeg. If you are in a genteel mood and can air the 2016 out, it will reward you with less oak notes and more bing cherry, strawberry (as opposed to the raspberry on the ‘18), and crushed red flowers. The 2016 in particular gives that potpourri tasting note its due, and there is also a ton of inorganic earth components (fresh potting soil, shitake mushroom). The aforementioned meatiness is also present on the midpalate of the 2016-a little more salted pork or proscuitto than the ‘18. That slightly more smoked and salted element gives the 2016 more gamey meat possibilities; grilled lamb shoulder or non-spicy boudin noir sausages have my mind racing to the kitchen.

Service and Cellar: I recommend a decanting of at least 30 minutes prior to enjoying either vintage. Both wines should be served at red wine cellar temperature (58-62 degrees F). If your logical mind is telling you to hold the 2018 and drink the 2016 first, you’re right: I think the 2018 Anthocyane has a life span that will border on 20 years (another 15 from now), while the 2016 can be enjoyed more readily at present and for the next 9-10 years. A quick note on the wax tops: don’t allow yourself to be frustrated hacking away at the red wax until your table resembles a crime scene; the Fleuriet wax caps are quite pliable, and you can easily take a corkscrew right through them and open as you would normally-just be mindful to give the bottle top a quick wipe with a cloth to make sure no microscopic wax pieces end up in your wineglass.