Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
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Vinous
The 2021 Roche aux Moines is serious stuff with its intense concentration and high levels of substance while maintaining precision. Hailing from this coveted vineyard within Savennières, there's no shortage of power and personality. Aromatically appealing, it is expressive and floral with length and a confident tannic structure. Young and compact, this has what it takes to go the long haul.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
Even purer and more complex than the Clos de Coulaine, the 2021 Roche Aux Moines from Château Pierre-Bise reveals a dense, deep bouquet with aromas of minerals, ripe orchard fruits, menthol, caramel, wet stones and sweet spices. Medium to full-bodied, satiny and enveloping, with a deep core of fruit, it’s fleshy with a mineral, saline finish enhanced by a delicate bitterness. It has a real potential to improve in the cellar over the next decade.
Rating: 92+
Unquestionably one of the most diverse grape varieties, Chenin Blanc can do it all. It shines in every style from bone dry to unctuously sweet, oaked or unoaked, still or sparkling and even as the base for fortified wines and spirits. Perhaps Chenin Blanc’s greatest asset is its ever-present acidity, maintained even under warm growing conditions. Somm Secret—Landing in South Africa in the mid 1800s, today the country has double the acreage of Chenin Blanc planted compared to France. There is also a new wave of dedicated producers committed to restoring old Chenin vines.
Known for its delightful whites and sparkling Pétillant and Mousseux, made predominantly of Chenin blanc, Anjou has a temperate and dry maritime climate. The region's limited temperature variations are admiringly referred to locally as the “douceur angevine,” or “Anjou sweetness.” Fruit forward rosé and red wines from Cabernet Franc and Gamay merit Anjou its success within the Loire subregions.