While the attractively juicy corresponding generic bottling was a bit too understated and tartly simple to merit more than mild recommendation; and one from Jolivet’s ten-acre monopole Chateau du Nozay (near the northern extreme of the appellation) clear and refreshing but scarcely more distinctive, not to mention faintly metallic in finish; their 2010 Sancerre Les Caillottes – from the eponymous soil in Bue – is anything but a retiring wallflower that one could overlook! Passion fruit, green apple, sage, and grass notes soar from the glass, then monopolize a firm palate of downright chewy piquancy, which when taken with tart juiciness serves for invigorating if hardly refined persistence. There is a hint here of what in the corresponding Chateau du Nozay bottling I called “metallic”, and which may be simply a function of especially prominent malic acid, a supposition supported by the tendency of either wine to leave my teeth feeling a slightly rubbery. I would be inclined to drink this over the next couple of years.
I suppose I ought not to have waited until the 25th anniversary of Pascal Jolivet’s now huge operation (just over a hundred estate acres in Sancerre and Pouilly, plus a roughly equal number under contract) to have canvassed an extended range of his wines, especially considering that he is among his region’s largest exporters and the wines virtually ubiquitous in U.S. markets. And even now, I limited myself to tasting samples, and then only wines currently exported from vintage 2010. The reason for my reticence (other, of course, than sheer time pressure) is that sporadic past encounters with Jolivet wines have left an impression of competence rather than excitement. The range here on the one hand extends to an extremely high-volume estate Touraine and a joint project in Hawkes Bay, New Zealand; and on the other, includes (as it has since early on in Jolivet’s history) a number of terroir- or vineyard-specific bottlings encompassing some well-known as well as some geographically marginal locations. The estate puts store in spontaneous fermentations and carefully controlled elevage of small lots by parcel. It must be said that like a couple of the Eastern Loire’s other biggest producers, if there are economies of scale here, they do not trickle down to the consumer, so that for less than the price of a good but uninspiring generic Sancerre or Pouilly-Fume from these giants, you could be savoring one of the couple dozen top wines of their respective appellations. (Regular readers will recognize that this opinion reflects no smaller-is-better prejudice, since there are many regions of France on which I report where the largest and most prominently exported brands offer both outstanding value and benchmark quality.) Jolivet emphasizes in his literature that “I have a strong philosophy that our wine is a beverage made to complement food,” but I am quite sure – as my tasting notes should already suggest – that you’ll need to choose carefully to find dishes capable of standing up to – much less generating synergy with – most of the tart, hard-edged examples I tasted from 2010.
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