Winemaker Notes
Generous and versatile with food, this is a wine that teases the mind while rewarding the palate—a remarkable balance for this price.
Professional Ratings
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Wine & Spirits
Kevin Fontaine, who took over this domaine when Charles Joguet retired, presents this wine as a “precocious cuvée,” meant for early drinking. His 2016, though immediately accessible, seems grander than that, full and fleshy in its red fruit, structured by supple tannins and vibrant acidity. It’s a joyous cabernet franc, especially in the company of steak frites.
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Wine Spectator
Fresh, with a floral note leading the way for bright cherry and bitter plum notes. Fresh savory and olive flashes line the finish. Drink now through 2021.
Cabernet Franc, a proud parent of Cabernet Sauvignon, is the subtler and more delicate of the Cabernets. Today Cabernet Franc produces outstanding single varietal wines across the wine-producing world. Somm Secret—One of California's best-kept secrets is the Happy Canyon appellation of Santa Barbara. Here Cabernet Franc shines as a single varietal wine or in blends, expressing sumptuous fruit, savory aromas and polished tannins.
An important red wine appellation in the Touraine district of the Loire, Chinon produces fanciful, light-bodied reds from the Cabernet Franc grape. Chinon also makes charming rosés from the same grape as well as white wines from Chenin blanc. But the reds give the area its fame. Often scented with fresh herbs, black tea and violets, Chinon reds show a lovely combination of fruit and acidity. However, styles have become more concentrated and ripe in recent years from improvements in vineyard management. Modern methods include planting grass between vineyard rows, using higher trellises and deleafing to increase sunlight to berries and therefore improve ripening. Even still, red Chinon is intended to be a light to medium bodied, refreshing wine to be enjoyed in its youth.
Fuller-bodied Chinons come from vineyard sites on the clay and tuffeau limestone slopes, usually from the southern exposed slopes of Cravant-les-Coteaux, and the plateau above Beaumont. Lighter styled wines come from the sand and gravel vineyards near the Loire or Vienne Rivers with the most refined examples coming from the area around Panzoult