- BrandThomas Labaille
- CountryFrance
- RegionLoire Valley
- TypeWhite Wine
- Size750ml
- SKU 210000047616
Thomas Labaille Sancerre L'Authentique Chavignol 2024
This wine is made of 100% Sauvignon Blanc. We would pair this with something bright and fresh: a citrus and goat cheese salad with nectarine, pomelo, and lemon, or some oysters for a little apértif. Originally labeled simply as "Sancerre", L'Authentique is Thomas-Labaille's multi-parcel estate bottling. All of the vines are on the Kimmeridgian limestone soils around Chavignol and average twenty-five years old; they are sustainably farmed and harvested by hand. The wine is fermented with native yeasts in fiberglass and cement tanks, aged on its lees in stainless steel tanks for four to six months and bottled without filtration.
The resulting wine is sensational rich, fat, round, with layered aromas, a subtle nose and a long finish. Not a typical bistro Sancerre, but a graceful wine meant for aging and pleasure.
This wine is sourced from 6.5 hectares of vines surounding the village of Chavignol. The vineyards remain among the best in Chavignol with a large proportion of old vines. The old barrels are not in use any more, but the vineyard and cellar work follow the same time-honored techniques.
The Monts Damnés plot is too steep a slope to ever consider machine harvesting, which is now the norm in the appellation, and it requires intensive, non-mechanized vineyard work. But drainage and exposure are excellent and ensure the best ripeness for the vintage. Labaille has somewhat tidied up Thomas' facilities, which used to be in sharp contrast to most cellars in the area: instead of a hyper-hygienic room, with wall-to-wall tiled floors and stainless steel vats, his was a Burgundian type of cellar.
