Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
-
Wine Enthusiast
This is a flagship wine from this historic producer. Produced from biodynamically grown grapes, it is poised between richness and elegance. A tense texture comes from the youth of the wine. Its potential shows in the richness and in the hints of minerality from the chalk soil. Drink from 2019.
Cellar Selection -
Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2014 Sancerre La Moussière Red is fine and very elegant on the beautifully pure, deep, quite intense and floral nose that is reminiscent of red rather than black cassis, black berries, lemon rind, leather and, with aeration, plums, indicating a certain sweetness and openness. It is a bit volatile perhaps but still in an acceptable way. Still young but very elegant and finessed on the palate, this is a full-bodied, dense and tightly structured yet pure Sancerre rouge with a silky texture, a juicy fruit core and an only initially slightly astringent finish. This has good length and concentration, and aeration helps to reduce the astringency on the finish. Tasted in January and February 2021.
Thin-skinned, finicky and temperamental, Pinot Noir is also one of the most rewarding grapes to grow and remains a labor of love for some of the greatest vignerons in Burgundy. Fairly adaptable but highly reflective of the environment in which it is grown, Pinot Noir prefers a cool climate and requires low yields to achieve high quality. Outside of France, outstanding examples come from in Oregon, California and throughout specific locations in wine-producing world. Somm Secret—André Tchelistcheff, California’s most influential post-Prohibition winemaker decidedly stayed away from the grape, claiming “God made Cabernet. The Devil made Pinot Noir.”
Marked by its charming hilltop village in the easternmost territory of the Loire, Sancerre is famous for its racy, vivacious, citrus-dominant Sauvignon blanc. Its enormous popularity in 1970s French bistros led to its success as the go-to restaurant white around the globe in the 1980s.
While the region claims a continental climate, noted for short, hot summers and long, cold winters, variations in topography—rolling hills and steep slopes from about 600 to 1,300 feet in elevation—with great soil variations, contribute the variations in character in Sancerre Sauvignon blancs.
In the western part of the appellation, clay and limestone soils with Kimmeridgean marne, especially in Chavignol, produce powerful wines. Moving closer to the actual town of Sancerre, soils are gravel and limestone, producing especially delicate wines. Flint (silex) soils close to the village produce particularly perfumed and age-worthy wines.
About ten percent of the wines claiming the Sancerre appellation name are fresh and light red wines made from Pinot noir and to a lesser extent, rosés. While not typically exported in large amounts, they are well-made and attract a loyal French following.