Jérémie Choquet, "Sansonnet" VDF 2020

Producer Profile: In a small town at the cross-roads of many different sub-regions and appellations -- between Touraine and the Upper Loire Valley, Cheverny and Chaumont-sur Loire -- there is an intrepid husband and wife winemaking team producing electrically singular bottlings. Around the village of Monthou-sur-Biévre, Jérémie and Blandine Choquet tend five hectares of vines. As with most winemaking teams, their story is one that is a combination of endeavor, fate, coincidence, and love. Jérémie, more than anything related to winegrowing, initially sought work in any agricultural field in the Loire Valley and landed as a property manager of a hunting estate in Sologne before getting a gig pruning trees around 2014 – a job he’d once held long ago before a knee problem prevented him from being able to continue work among the trees. The same knee issue flared up again this time around, leading him inevitably to the vineyard; a windfall, especially considering that his partner Blandine was a trained enologist! And so, with some help from a few generous Loire Valley natural winemaking friends (PO Bonhomme, among them) in securing an old grain container and some land, they’ve become one of our favorite new winegrowing endeavors in this area of the Loire, their wines replete with purity of fruit and impressive acidic verve.

Vinification: 100% Gamay. Grapes were hand-harvested and vinified whole cluster with wild yeasts in stainless steel. The wine rests briefly in old oak and is bottled unfined, unfiltered with no SO2. 

Tasting: Jérémie's goal for the 2020 Sansonnet was to make it fresher and lighter than previous vintages. It's delicate and juicy, but finishes with just enough warming, peppery spice to keep it interesting and able to hold up to food. Serve just below room temp.