Pristine Touraine Chenin Blanc, or Pineau de la Loire as it is sometimes known in this part of the world. From 25 year-old vines in a half-hectare parcel planted over a limestone bed with a mixed topsoil of rocks and quartz-rich sands, the wine has a degree of opulence from being both fermented and then raised for 8 months in a big, old 2500-litre foudre. Like all of Mikaël's wines from the dry 2022 vintage, there is a chiselled structure and profound minerality, the vines having reached deep down to the limestone bedrock for nutrients.
White peach and spices with taut acidity and a delicate, honeyed quality, neatly balanced out with a pronounced salty minerals. A wine of precision and poise that has the potential to age incredibly well over the coming years.
Mikaël Bouges works over 8 hectares of land split into various parcels dotted around Faverolles-sur- Cher in Touraine. He learned to tend vines and make wine with his father who had already established the domaine as certified organic as far back as the early 90s, so a thoughtful approach in the vineyard and in the cellar has been with him from the start. The vines sit in the vicinity of the river Cher and as a result have soils of gravelly limestone, speckled with various alluvial deposits of quartz and silex left behind from the historical flow of the water over the centuries. His trademark style is to translate this mineral aspect into the wine - they clearly speak of this typically middle-Loire terroir. In the cellar the wines ferment spontaneously and are not filtered or fined, some with just a small amount of sulphur used only at bottling, some with none at all. We feel they can be very classical in their expression; clean, bright and with incredible purity. We love to pour them for those who are in some way dubious about this very logical way of working - Mikaël’s wines tend to put paid to the sceptics. Displaying an uncanny knack for the ancestral method, Mikaël produces a couple of immaculate pét-nats made with zero additions that number some of the more easygoing and immediate of his output. He also recently began to experiment with a no-sulphur Sauvignon Blanc cuvée, to much success. His other wines are made under the Touraine AOC and display a certain typicity. Those from the younger vines are made completely in tank and are ideal for the table; the older vines see an extended élevage in old barrels and invite deeper contemplation.
