Savennieres: The Best Wine You’ve Never Tasted
Hint: It’s French and it’s inexpensive.
Jamie Mah @grahammah
When I was doing my wine studies a few years back, sitting in class often came with a bit of duress. I was there to learn all the nuaces of what made wine tic, but in doing so what I came to learn very quickly was that there was a lot more to grasp than I’d come to realize. The world of wine can be intense and daunting. Wine is now being made more globally then ever before and as such it’s vastness brings with it much diversity, which is good, but also a little confusing. For most of us, the staples are what we come to know early on, think Cabernet Sauvignon and Chardonnay or even Sideways stalwart Pinot Noir. These varietal names resonate as they’ve been promoted and marketed so as to make this vast wine world somewhat easier to navigate. But throughout this comfort and branding sometimes some of the best kept secrets fall through the cracks. Had I never sat and done my wine training, Savenniers might still very well be a mystery to me. I’m happy it isn’t.
I remember the day we tasted THE bottle that got me excited, Clos du Papillon 2008 Savennieres. It was during my WSET Diploma night class in 2013. We were tasting french whites when this wine passed me by. At first it was super unique on the nose. Chenin Blanc, the grape varietal for this style of wine, often has a wet wool damp mustiness to it. Since I had no frame of reference to what it might be, the smell partly caught me off guard. I say this in a very pleasing way mind you. Most white varietals can either come across as very neutral, think most whites from Italy or they’re buttery in the case of California Chardonnay or they’re aromatic like Riesling and Muscat. Chenin Blanc kind of falls in between or at least in it’s own category. The mustiness is very apparent once you know what you’re looking for and it’s this smell that I’m totally drawn to.
Terroir is this very common term thrown about by Sommeliers, Winemakers and Oenephiles as a way of describing how wine comes from it’s place of origin. In thinking with this approach, Savennieres, which is produced in the Northern part of France, comes to be a cool climate style of wine with high acidity and high alcohol. Anyone who knows me well knows that the Loire is by far my favourite region as I believe it showcases the widest range of styles anywhere in the World. Savennieres to me is the best of what they do — yes even more so than Sancerre. Tucked away up on the northern slopes of Anjou near the town of Angers, Savennieres finds itself as one of the only areas in the Loire which produces a “dry” style of Chenin Blanc as most are either moelleux (sweet) or made into bubbles.
Savennieres is a wine meant to age as it possesses all the qualities (a balance of acid, alcohol and good wine making) needed to lay down for years or even a decade or two. With this cohesion, Savennieres wines can take on a whole new life of their own in the bottle, and as wine writer Jancis Robinson MW once wrote “turn into a wine with a haunting cocktail of hedgerow and brimfire.”
Some wines are meant to be expensive while others are meant to be had on a hot summers night or just to chug back while at home watching a movie. Others are best when accompanied with delicious food. Savennieres falls into this latter camp. Consumed with friends or on your own with a nice meal I’m recommending you give this style of wine a try. It’s funky and a bit different which to me makes it special.
Here are some bottles worth keeping your eyes on:
Nicolas Joly, Coulée de Serrant
Dom du Closel, Clos du Papillon
Damien Laureau, Roche aux Moines
Patrick Baudoin
Dom des Baumard
Dom de la Bergerie, La Croix Picot
Dom du Closel, La Jalousie