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Region: France - Languedoc - Cabrerisse
Grapes: 100% Carignan
Alcohol: 14.5%
Notes on the Wine
Our Cabrerisse comes from 40-60 year-old Carignan vines, dry-farmed in the stony landscape of this small Languedoc appellation. Winemaker Anne Sarda works her vineyards by hand, and the wine is fermented with native, ambient yeasts and aged in concrete vessels up to 105 years old.
Notes on the Producer
The Languedoc: the best-value wine region in France, where viticulture is central to the economy and produces more wine than any other region in France. For many years the Languedoc was known more for quantity than quality, but aggressive vine-pull schemes coupled with a renewed interest in quality from independent winemakers have changed the landscape significantly. What hasn’t changed is that it is – and has always been – as Jancis Robinson puts it, “the land of the proud peasant farmer.”
Our winemaker Anne Sarda and her team do their vineyard work by hand. Carignan vines, up to 60 years old, grow as bush vines at 130 meters altitude, necessitating hand harvest and producing low yields of 30 hl/ha. The climate is dry and the vines struggle in their stony soils – too stony to even plant cover crops. It is a wild and rural landscape, yet strikingly beautiful and natural. No pesticides, no herbicides, and no irrigation are employed. The estate is HVE Level 3 Certified.
After the intense labor in the vineyards, Anne works with a delicate touch in the cellar. Spontaneous fermentation by native, ambient yeasts takes place in large concrete tanks, followed by 10 days’ maceration, then aging in old concrete vessels that are at least 60 (and up to 105 years!) old. The wine is not fined, just lightly filtered and an infinitesimal 2 g/hl of sulfur is added right before bottling.
Saint Laurent de la Cabrerisse is one of the 5 municipalities that qualify for the small Coteaux de Cabrerisse IGP. Anne’s rendition of it – expressing all the character of those old Carignan vines on stony soils – is intense and pure.
