Hommage à Louis Derré

Hommage à Louis Derré is a wine created in 2000 and produced from vines of over 80 to 100 years. This wine combines the usual work of extraction with the concentration and the complexity due to the age of the vines.

• APPELLATION:
  - Red Coteaux du Loir.
• GRAPE VARIETY:
  - Pineau d’Aunis 100.%. Vines over 80 to 100 years.
• SOIL (TERROIR):
  - Clayey and siliceous clay with flint on tuffeau (limestone). The soils with strong clays are favourable for reds.
• VITICULTURE:
  - Ground works : ploughing, earthing-up and hoeing. No weed killers.
  - Maximum yields 25 hl/ha. Manual harvest.
• VINIFICATION:
  - One month in vat for alcoholic fermentation, breaking the cap, systematic blending of free run wine with press wine, natural malolactic fermentation in recent barrels.
  Maturing one year in 3-5 year old barrels.
  - The final balance is the work of nature.
• TASTING:
  - 2004 : Displays ripe fresh black cherry along with smoky, meaty and wet stone aromas. Deeply rich cherry fruit mingles with concentrated bitter chocolate and black tea on the palate, revealing mysteriously meat and mineral dimensions, along with the structure and concentration for 3-5 years of further bottle evolution. Mark: 91 /100 - Robert Parker's Wine Advocate #172
• SERVICE:
  - Service: In carafe one hour before drinking at 18°C.
  - Goes with: Casserole of young partridge and pheasant. Complements an “ossau iraty” (ewe’s milk cheese from mountains) aged two years (as suggested by Mrs Abadie, Restaurant L’Amphitryon in Lorient).
  See also: maturity period and food matches

PRESS REVIEWS

Robert Parker

2005: 91 /100
2004: 91 /100   (Wine Advocate #172)

Classement des Meilleurs Vins de France

2005: 17 /20  (2007 edition)

La Revue du Vin de France

2003 : 5 stars - The bouquet is complex with very intense fruit, first mouth is dense, tannins are powerful and coated with fruit. Excellent balance. (April 2005)
2002: Dark and dense, with enhanced and fine tannins. Rare. (June 2003)

Guide Bettane & Dessauve

2003: 8.5 /10  (2005 ed.)
2002: 10 / 10 - Ripe and dense, reminiscent of the earthy power of pinots from Côte de Nuits (2004)

Decanter

2002: Defies its medium colour to show unbelievable purity and length of fruit, a modern wine from the past.
(May 2004)