La Cabane de Jeanne 2023 - Les Bories Jefferies
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La Cabane de Jeanne 2023 - Les Bories Jefferies
Grenache Blanc, Grenache Gris, Ugni Blanc · Languedoc, France · 75cl
Pickup available at 3 Cornmarket Street
Usually ready in 2-4 days
How to serveLightly chilled, 10 to 12°C. Give it half an hour in the glass or a decanter.
From thirty year old vines planted over 0.7 hectares across Joe’s three parcels in Caux. Everything was harvested by hand on the same day. Both Grenache varieties and half of the Ugni went straight to the press. The remaining bunches of Ugni Blanc were then submerged in the direct press juice to macerate for 6 days. The macerated bunches were then pressed off and the juice was blended with the rest. The wine was racked of gross lees at the end of fermentation and aged for 21 months in tank on the fine lees. All movements by gravity, including bottling.
Big complexity on the nose, with propolis, ginger biscuit, rosemary, lemon oil, and vine peach. We have fruit volume on the palate, with substantial mineral compression and great drinking flow, all tethered by fine, pithy tannins from the Ugni. From this latest vintage, Joe has shifted to crown cap for his closures.
The producer
Joe’s introduction to wine came via legendary vigneron Bernard Bellahsen, from whom Joe bought bread at a local market. When the opportunity to take charge of 3 hectares of vines from his father-in-law presented itself, encouragement from Bernard, along with Julien Peyras and Antony Tortul of la Sorga, emboldened Joe to accept.
He went back to study winemaking in Montpellier, and despite the guidance of his well-seasoned mentors, initially worked with an oenologist and made wines to ‘the Languedoc recipe’. Robust, bold, reds with big tannins and high alcohol conformed to the status quo, and whites that received filtration and generous sulfitage. Growing frustrated with his inability to find the unique terroir of Caux in his wines, and endless arguments with the oenologue on his books, Joe began to practice the methods of his early mentors, ceasing debourbage post press, filtration, sulfitage, and, scandalously, began vinifying the reds with carbonic maceration. In the vines, the work is far beyond the requirements of organic, and his treatments in the vines are minimal and preventative rather than responsive.
After 12 years, Joe’s wines have become definitive of the new Languedoc, utterly elegant and vital while retaining the Mediterranean soul and ripe fruit of southern France. They are remarkable wines that detail the breadth of possibilities one can uncover in the Languedoc.
The place
The Grenache grows on red clay, gravel, and basalt scree, with the Ugni Blanc coming from clay, limestone and basalt scree. The basalt scree comes from the Volcan des Baumes, which erupted 1.25 million years ago dispersing chunks of hardened lava where these vines now grow.
The maceration technique Joe uses here, what he calls trempette(dip/dunk), is a type of carbonic maceration. The bunches of Ugni Blanc are submerged intact in the direct press juice, creating an anaerobic environment in the same way CO2 works in standard carbonic maceration. The berries and stems never break, so the extraction from the exterior of the berries and stems is quite gentle. We can feel this is the fine tannins. Inside the berries an intracellular fermentation is triggered, which contributes to the aromatic complexity of the wine.
This is Joe’s variation on a technique often credited to Daniel Sage, a reclusive vigneron and négociant working high in the Haute-Loire, whose delicately extracted wines were made by gently submerging intact bunches in direct press juice. Though the technique hardly originated with Sage, he certainly repopularised it in a contemporary context.
Grapes: Grenache Gris, Grenache Blanc, Ugni Blanc
Region: Caux, Languedoc, France