By Domaine des Patureaux
Pouilly-Fumé 2015
100% Sauvignon Blanc

The soils of Pouilly, made up of Kimmeridgian marls and hard calcareous rock and flint, give Pouilly-Fumé wine minerality and freshness, length and definition in the mouth, along with a lively character that makes it stand apart. “It’s that little extra that we will always have here,” Marius Tabordet confides to me with a chuckle. The 21 acres Domaine des Patureaux own in Pouilly-Fumé cover the appellation’s three distinct terroirs, all planted with 25 year-old 100% Sauvignon Blanc vines, or Blanc Fumé as it is known here. Caillottes (pebbles) are stony, compact chalk limestone soils without much clay or marl, found lower on the slopes, producing fruity and elegantly balanced wines. Silex (flint) are clay soils containing pieces of flint 2 to 8 inches in size. These soils produce a lively Pouilly-Fumé wine with the characteristic mineral aroma of gunflint, reaching its peak potential in its 2nd year of aging. Terres Blanches (white soils) refers to the seashell-rich limestone pebble soils with clay marls, found higher on the hillsides generally, which turn white in dry periods. This soil produces rich, full-bodied wines.

 

Marius, who runs the domaine along with his father Pascal and cousin Gael, is very open as to the source of the wine’s quality. “There’s no secret,” he tells me, “it all happens at the vine.” It’s a case of a perfect match between terroir and grape variety, with average temperatures ideally suited to Sauvignon Blanc, a vine that thrives in this limestone. The team carefully works the soils and uses as little chemical intervention as possible. Vines are kept healthy, de-budded and de-leafed. Grapes are tasted straight from the vine to decide when to harvest.

 

Winemaking is kept very simple, the grapes pressed for 2 hours at low pressure, and one neutral yeast used for fermentation, in new stainless steel tanks. The 3 different terroirs are kept separate as long as possible, and then blended masterfully, the terres blanches bringing roundness, the caillottes a fruit and floral character, and the silex an underlying tension holding it together.