Pierre Menard Le Clos Des Mailles Chenin Blanc 2020

Pierre Menard Le Clos Des Mailles Chenin Blanc 2020

Pierre Menard
$38.00

Grape: Chenin Blanc
Vintage: 2020
Type: White

Pierre Menard's Chenin Blanc vines from the Clos de Mailles vineyard are found on the highest point of the hillside on phthalite (siltstone) and schist soils. This beauty of a wine comes from the 2020 vintage which in the Loire was warm and solar, but Ménard’s early picking and biodynamic farming preserved a "electric" acidity that keeps the wine from feeling heavy. On the nose shy and slightly reductive (flinty/smoky), it opens up into a complex bouquet of yellow apple, quince, and chamomile, with exotic hints of baked pineapple and acacia honey. It is medium-to-full-bodied but incredibly "sleek and slatey." You get a juicy mid-palate of ripe stone fruit balanced by a high, saline acidity and a "pithy" citrus bitterness. A long and mineral finish with a distinct wet stone and sea salt sensation that lingers well after the wine is gone.

Pierre Menard grew up in a winemaking family in Anjou. He went on to study winemaking in Angers and to work stints in Pauillac at Chateau Latour, in the Duoro, Canada, New Zealand and in Tokaj, Hungary.

When he returned home to Anjou, he began farming a few rows of his family’s old vine Chenin and Sauvignon Blanc. Traditionally his parents sold the grapes from all 13 hectares of their vines to a cooperative, but they agreed to let him keep some for his own project. In 2013, while still in his twenties, he bottled a miniscule number of bottles in a garage turned wine cellar. This inaugural vintage was received with great critical acclaim and a rising star of Anjou was born. Since then, Pierre has expanded his holdings to more than 1.5 hectares, all farmed biodynamically. He makes several bottlings of Chenin Blanc from these old vines, all dry.

Hand harvesting, gentle pneumatic pressing, fermentation, and aging in a combination of used barrels, sandstone amphora, and tank.