His enfant terrible days now more or less behind him, Olivier may have mellowed with age but is as principled as ever and his wine is grown and vinified in exactly the same way it always was. It’s more a matter of scale. He now works a focussed 4 hectares rather than 12, the difference has been passed on to his son Baptiste who takes on the torch and makes superb wine of his own labelled La Batossay. 

Half a hectare is Chenin Blanc and another half Gamay. Three hectares are an even split of Cabernet Franc on a long, slowly sloping brow of argilo-calcaire; the half towards the bottom are younger vines planted in the late 90s over a higher percentage of clay, the half at the top are his prized massale selection vines, each grafted by his grandfather in the late 40s sitting over a higher concentration of limestone.

A look around the cellar and it’s hard to tell which decade you might be in, apart from a light switch there is little in the way of technology. Big old wooden vats are positioned on two levels so grapes can be crushed and their juice moved from one to the other by gravity, a manual basket press, a metal mesh table to destem clusters of grapes by hand, a clay qvevri stood semi-upright in a tractor tyre. As you’d imagine, the resulting wines have a earthly, elemental quality and are a true taste of Anjou. Rustic, bold and imbued with authenticity and soul, this is what we talk about when we talk about ‘real wine’. 

After being harder to find in the UK in recent years, we’re immensely proud to shout about Oliver’s dedicated work once again and offer the full selection of his brilliant wine to lovers of the real deal, old and new.

A special mention goes to Clement, Olivier's other son who has found himself in our part of the world and opened the wonderful bistro Bavette with his husband Sandy. It goes without saying that you can always find a selection of the family wines in their amply-stocked cellar too.