Winemaker Notes
Floral nose with black berries and spices. A mouth with aromas of cassis, bouquet of garrigue. It is an elegant and refined wine, tannic while remaining fresh.
Blend: 30% Clairette, 20% Roussanne, 20% Grenache Blanc, 10% Bourboulenc, 10% Picpoul Blanc, 10% Clairette Rosé.
Professional Ratings
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Decanter
Restrained aromatics lead to a full-bodied palate with great textural wealth. Not as obviously oaky as the domaine’s other cuvées (though it is certainly generously oaked), this has some interesting grain and relief to the texture, and a long finish. Powerful, saline and well balanced despite its richness and flamboyance. Also contains 10% each of Bourboulenc, Clairette Rose and Piquepoul Blanc. This is the third vintage of this cuvée and already it's proving to be one of the most exciting white Châteauneufs available.
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James Suckling
Complex nose of brioche and bergamot with notes of candied oranges and white flowers. For such a full-bodied and rich dry white, this is very graceful, and ends with an intense stony minerality. A cuvee of one third clairette, one third roussanne and one third grenache blanc from biodynamically grown grapes. Matured in three-year-old oak.
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Wine Spectator
This offers a gorgeous kaleidoscope of fruit -- kumquat, yellow plum, starfruit and quince -- atop a bed of silky-fine mineral notes and subtly bitter tannins. Honeyed, full and rich, with a refined texture and a very long finish edged in piecrust and toast, showing acid verve and impressive structure. Drink now through 2030.
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Jeb Dunnuck
I loved the 2022 Châteauneuf Du Pape Vin De La Solitude Blanc, an exotic, floral white based on 30% Clairette, 20% each Roussanne and Grenache Blanc, and the rest Clairette Rose, Picpoul, and Bourboulenc. Ripe melon, honeyed orange, toasted bread, and minty herbs all emerge from this complex, nuanced, medium-bodied beauty, and it has good depth and richness, a great sense of freshness, and outstanding length.
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Vinous
Mixing 60% Clairette with 20% Grenache Blanc and 20% Roussanne, the 2022 Châteauneuf-duPape Blanc Vin de la Solitude is magnificent. Spring blossom, apple skin, white peach, lemon flesh and pear aromas jump out of the glass. Offering excellent tension and freshness on the fullbodied palate, the 2022 closes with a sapid and focused finale of impressive length.
Full-bodied and flavorful, white Rhône blends originate from France’s Rhône Valley. Today these blends are also becoming popular in other regions. Typically some combination of Grenache Blanc, Marsanne, Roussanne and Viognier form the basis of a white Rhône blend with varying degrees of flexibility depending on the exact appellation. Somm Secret—In the Northern Rhône, blends of Marsanne and Roussanne are common but the south retains more variety. Marsanne, Roussanne as well as Bourboulenc, Clairette, Picpoul and Ugni Blanc are typical.
Famous for its full-bodied, seductive and spicy reds with flavor and aroma characteristics reminiscent of black cherry, baked raspberry, garrigue, olive tapenade, lavender and baking spice, Châteauneuf-du-Pape is the leading sub-appellation of the southern Rhône River Valley. Large pebbles resembling river rocks, called "galets" in French, dominate most of the terrain. The stones hold heat and reflect it back up to the low-lying gobelet-trained vines. Though the galets are typical, they are not prominent in every vineyard. Chateau Rayas is the most obvious deviation with very sandy soil.
According to law, eighteen grape varieties are allowed in Châteauneuf-du-Pape and most wines are blends of some mix of these. For reds, Grenache is the star player with Mourvedre and Syrah coming typically second. Others used include Cinsault, Counoise and occasionally Muscardin, Vaccarèse, Picquepoul Noir and Terret Noir.
Only about 6-7% of wine from Châteauneuf-du-Pape is white wine. Blends and single-varietal bottlings are typically based on the soft and floral Grenache Blanc but Clairette, Bourboulenc and Roussanne are grown with some significance.
The wine of Chateauneuf-du-Pape takes its name from the relocation of the papal court to Avignon. The lore says that after moving in 1309, Pope Clément V (after whom Chateau Pape-Clément in Pessac-Léognan is named) ordered that vines were planted. But it was actually his successor, John XXII, who established the vineyards. The name however, Chateauneuf-du-Pape, translated as "the pope's new castle," didn’t really stick until the 19th century.