Tasted with Jean-Marie Chaland in Hurigny, 04 November 2022.
Domaine Sainte Barbe
Rue En Chapotin
71260 Viré
Tel: +33 9 64 48 09 44
www.jeanmariechaland.com
More reports with Domaine Sainte Barbe
Jean-Marie on 2022:
“2022 yes! We made some wine! Dry and ripe – it’s a good vintage and a very different style to 2021 – probably more 2018-2019 in style. The fermentations were slow and some are not yet finished…”
Jean-Marie on 2021:
“According to my father, the domaine’s worst volume vintage was 1967 – it was a catastrophe says my father – but this was the worst that I’ve seen – 50% less. All the wines here are bottled – but only bottled 3 days!”
The wines…
Simply delicious wines in 2021!
All cork seals for the wines here, each individually checked for TCA:
2021 Viré-Clessé Vieilles-Vignes
North of the appellation. A soil rich in iron and manganese. ‘11.5° – but you would never thank anything amiss…’ 10 months of elevage in foudres
A smaller nose but here is still energy. Supple, good concentration here. Slight herb and lots of fresh complexity. Not quite opulent but layered and completely delicious – plenty of energy too. That’s absolutely lovely
2021 Viré-Clessé Chazelles
South of the Viré appellation. Bottled end of July after foudre and few demi-muids and barrels for elevage.
More vertical aromatics with floral notes at the top. A little framing with tannin but fine-grained – citrus bitters – delicious again…
2021 Viré-Clessé La Perrière
30-yo vines on a plateau.
More width of aroma, still floral in this case. Super flashes of complexity and pure flavour mixed with structure and a growing roundness of middle flavour that slowly, mouth-wateringly fades in the finish. Simply excellent, delicious, wine…
Back to the north of the appellation with very old vines here.
The floral component remains but here with an extra-vibrancy of depth – quite mineral here too. More intense fruit flavour, slightly spiced too. Opening out in the finish with finesse and lots of florals again – this is just 3 days in its bottle. Bravo!
2019 Viré-Cless Clos de Buc
A clos only 200m from the last wine, quite high – 0.30 ha of older vines – 80 years old – under the forest so it’s a cool place. A family purchase in 2017 – grey-blue marne here. Only released after 2 years in bottle
Broad and complex – the first wine with some visible oak but not to the detriment of its energy. A little softer but still with some proper structure – I would carafe this to open out the flavours a little more – generous but still zesty wine.