M. Chapoutier Les Varonniers Crozes Hermitage Rouge 2020

Description

M. Chapoutier Les Varonniers Crozes Hermitage Rouge 2020 is part of Chapoutier’s Fac et Spera Sélection Parcellaire range of wines, a range of specially selected parcels of single vineyard wines which Chapoutier describe as a “precise ‘photographic’ image of a terroir”, a snapshot of a grape, in a certain year, in a given terroir. Fac & Spera means “Do & Hope”.

Maison Chapoutier has grown into one of the largest and most recognisable producers of Rhone wines. The company dates back to 1808 when Michel Chapoutier’s distant ancester Polydor Chapoutier bought a parcel of vines in the Rhone Valley. Today the Chapoutier has vineyard throughout the Rhone from Côte Rôtie in the north to Luberon in the south as well as having overseas projecs like Domaine Tournon in Victoria, Australia. Michel is committed to making the best wines whilst respecting the environment. Chapoutier now owns the largest biodynamic vineyard in Europe. It is his personal conviction that “the complexity in a wine comes from the level of microbiological activity around the vine roots”. Soils on the Chapoutier estate never see pesticides or herbicides, floral growth amongst the vines is essential, and the natural cycles of earth, sun and moon are also considered.

M. Chapoutier Les Varonniers Crozes Hermitage is 100% Syrah. The grapes for this wine come from Chapoutier’s oldest Crozes-Hermitage vines (more than 60 years old on average). The vines are planted on granitic slopes which are orientated South-West at the end of the Hermitage hill and on fluvial terraces on the “Varogne” plot.

The grapes are hand harvested at peak maturity. Vinification is in a small concrete tank. The wine undergoes a longe fermentation for around one month to fully polymerize tannins. Only free-run juice is used. This wine is matured in oak casks (some new) for 14 to 18 months.