2022 was full of unexpected twists. It was a capricious vintage, but finally everything turned out well.

Following the cold mornings in March and early April, we did not suffer significant losses from frost. From May onwards, we had to face a major drought. Maintaining the land and getting rid of competing grass became essential to preserve resources of remaining water in the soil.

Flowering took place under good conditions, but a period of violent storms in late June/early July had us trembling. One in particular was incredibly violent and traversed the Loir et Cher on June 19th, passing east of Cheverny and severely affecting many of our neighbors in Touraine. But we were not touched, save for about 10 minutes of very small hailstones that did not damage our just-formed bunches.

From that period the summer remained dry and hot; the young vines really suffered here. But one positive aspect was that we did not have to worry or protect the vines from mildew from June 20th onwards: this has never happened here before! On the flip-side, we had to keep a maximum of foliage to try and keep the bunches covered for risk of them getting sunburned.

We waited until September 5th to begin the harvest, which was wise as the summer heatwaves began to subside and rain in the very first days of the month benefitted the grapes' maturities. We had to be quick in harvesting the Sauvignon  before the sugars became too high. With an average yield of 30hl/ha, the first juices are quite promising.

The Sauvignons were followed by the Pinot and Gamay - a great vintage for the red grapes, remarkable even for the Pinot: fantastic grapes, good tannins and color.

To top things off, it was an exceptional vintage for the Romorantin. Despite the constant drought, the yields are quite satisfying, 30hl/ha on the old vines and 50hl/ha on the young ones. Despite some very precocious maturities, the last parcel of Romo was picked on October 4th; the acidities have been conserved throughout after fermentation and it makes us think we will produce a stand out vintage.

François, Claudie

Henri, Onorine

2022!!! Finally a vintage that rewards our efforts! But also a year that re-assured us that we can continue making wine in this septentrional region we love so much. It's also a year that proves that higher yields (always balanced, artisinal sense) can be synonymous with quality when you listen to Nature.

Yet again, the 2022 vintage almost turned to catastrophe due to frost in Spring. It was certainly not as intense as the last few years but still very present! It was finally time to put our new style of “Malbrot” pruning to the test, a technique where you prune in two times, permitting a much later pruning of the canes destined to bear fruit. This year, it was a resounding success! It will of course take many years of experimentation and follow-through to really conclude its worth, but this go-round gives us a lot of hope.

Now past the point where frost could hurt us, the vines grew at a leisurely pace, with favorable weather for flowering. Some rains kept us on our toes, and we maintained a very precise treatment regiment in order to spray the least amount of copper possible while maintaining optimal foliage. In June, we did have a little episode of odium in a small sector in the heart of Jasnières, but again we nipped this in the bud with a well calculated treatment.

We were also meticulous and vigilant with the amount of grass in the vines and made sure to properly aerate the soils from fall 2021 to Spring 2022, permitting us to apprehend drought issues in a very serene manner. The grapes were beginning to look good, and we were able to follow them through all the way to harvest.

We began picking on the earliest date in the estate’s history, September 6th. As the harvest went on, some intermittent rain helped plump up the grapes and promoted optimal maturation throughout the vineyard. The quality of the grapes, both in red and white, is magnificent. A slow and precise pressing for the whites and a meticulous maceration for the reds gave us nice juices that are fermenting tranquilly in wood.

This was also the most intense harvest of the estate’s history, spanning four entire weeks with a team of 30 formidable pickers. We really have to show them respect because everyone was a rookie (though highly motivated) and together they harvested the most grapes we’ve ever taken in.

In the cellar, my wife Laure-Anne was there to reception the team and to manage the juices, assisted by Jérôme who’s just getting started in the world of wine and has replaced our past employee, as well as Héloïse who came to intern and learn about vinification. Of course, my father and Michel (our two favorite retirees) were never too far to give some advice or lend a helping hand.

This generous harvest also permitted us to do pick some late-harvest Chenin and Pineau d’Aunis to make our liquoreux cuvées "Elixir de Tuf" and "Aurore d’Automne". Now we let the wines ferment at their own rhythm, paying close attention to make sure they are in the best conditions.

We are very excited to share all of these with you!

Clément & Laure-Anne, Eric & Christine Nicolas

The 2022 harvest has passed and we are now focused on the new production!

It was a beautiful harvest, with ideal climatic conditions: it wasn't too hot, with rains only arrived in some contradas without disturbing the harvest much. This year was very challenging because I doubled production in 2022 to around 14,000 bottles!  

Working on small, individual vinifications, the harvest lasted more than a month. In the cellar, I didn't have any fermentation problems, everything went smoothly. As has been the case since the beginning, my wines are sewn by hand: "Occhio di Sale", "Le Robbe" and "Solfare" are each the union of different parcels and vinifications, while "Passofonduto" is the expression of a single vineyard, but there are also some novelties!

I'll try to summarize everything!

OCCHIO DI SALE, the rosato: 

The base consists in part of an early harvest of Nero d'Avola grapes planted on white clay and limestone (trubi) and Cataratto grapes planted on sandstone, both direct-pressed and blended with a second vinification of Nero d'Avola and Inzolia macerated on the skins. Everything fermented in wood and was then blended in stainless steel. It's a little pinker than last year. 4,000 bottles and 150 magnums to be released in December or January. A new wine with energy.

LE ROBBE, the traditional red:

Harvested in three passes, from the same three historic vineyards (clay and chalk, sandstone and Turbi respectively). It consists of Nero d'Avola and a small percentage of white grapes: I approach this wine with shorter macerations and used more chestnut wood for aging, a perfect marriage. 4000 bottles, available in Spring.

SOLFARE, the white:

The white grapes this year, due to drought, ripened much earlier than the reds. There is more alcohol than past vintages, but luckily my territory has maintained acidity and salinity. Grillo, Cataratto and a little Muscat of Alexandria. Different parcels and harvest times, macerations for a maximum of two days, fermentations partly in steel and partly in oak. Approximately 3500 bottles produced.

PASSOFONDUTO, the red from the vineyard of gobelets on chalk:

It was an almost surgical harvest: drought and heat really made the Contrada Passofonduto suffer! But I managed to get a good result, less alcoholic than last year, same character, but more elegant. I look forward to the final result! Fermentation and aging in old oak barrels. About 1800 bottles produced,  available next fall.

There are two other new cuvées:

- The VIGNA DI BIANCO from the Contrada Passofonduto will not be included in "Solfare" because it showed a very strong identity, the power of gobelets planted on clay and chalk bring salty and elegant notes on the palate. A revelation for me. I will continue to plant mixed vines of Inzolia, Catarratto and Moscato d'Alessandria on chalk. I did a quick maceration for a few hours, the wine then fermented and aged in old oak. About 500 bottles will be available next fall.

-A 100% Moscato d'Alessandria fermented and aged in a single chestnut barrel will give life to an AROMATIC REVOLUTION. I've also decided to not use these grapes for "Solfare" anymore, precisely because of their aromatic complexity. After a two day maceration, the wine fermented and aged in a new chestnut barrel. 500 bottles and 30 magnums will be released next fall. 

Now I'm starting to dwell on the wines, but my handcrafted work requires diversity and a creative spirit!

I hope to drink together soon!

The harvest went very well, we had a super team and the grapes were perfect and qualitative. Now we’re on to the  ermentions!

Finally a nice vintage! Especially after the catastrophic 2021. 

We did feel some stress in April, temperatures were flirting with frost conditions and we were 1° away from getting hit. The rest of the season was rather favorable and classic despite the incredibly hot and dry summer. This is really where you see that organic viticulture has its cards to play: our vines suffered a lot less than our "classic" conventional neighbors. 

Despite the lack of water, we decided to not rush into harvesting. And it was a good move because we were gifted with rain in early September! We started on September 14th and finished October 30th in perfect conditions. 

We are very happy with 2022, the quantity is good and the quality is very satisfying. 

Here is my little harvest report for the 2022 vintage. Even though it's always hard to know the results at this stage of things!

I would describe the summer as: extremely dry! It will certainly have marked the year: extreme heat and a lack of water, no rain from Spring until August 15th! We did get 17mm that helped out on August 17th, though it could not save the vines suffering most. 

We picked our first grapes on August 11th in an attempt to save the youngest vines under the most stress. Once those were done, we waited until August 27th for the real start of the harvest. For the terroirs less affected by drought (the coteaux with clay exposed North), the bunches were small but plentiful. We were very happy with the results there. 

Early September was marked by intense storms. This slowed down the harvest but also brought a bit more juice into the berries... It also resulted in the longest harvest in the estate's history, in total four long, hard weeks.

In the end we had good quantity, with only a few parcels suffering extremely. This was honestly a surprise and a relief! Nature nonetheless remains conciliatory! The juices are full of fruit and nice material, high alcohol of course but well integrated. 

We are rather satisfied with this vintage and all its twists and turns!

November 21st, 2022.

After another winter without much cold weather, we were ready for potential frost in late-March/early April, right when budding was starting. For a second there, it felt like we were going to have a "remake" of 2021: once again, April 3rd and 4th announced sub-freezing temperatures. This time we decided to take whatever precautions we could, most notably a later pruning to delay budding on the more vulnerable vines on the bottom of our coteaux. We also did a contact treatment of pulverized pectin in Franclieu the day before the announced frost (this reinforces the grapes to withstand an additional 1 to 2 degrees of cold). Finally, we created a few fires from old vine trunks. It was announced to drop to  -3°- 4° but only got down to -1°, resulting only in a snow flurry. What a relief!

We then had a fairly normal Spring without any excess in water. But it was already trending towards drought by May, setting off a particularly early flowering period similar to 2003 (from May 18th to the 29th). Under good conditions, we anticipated a harvest in August.

June was very dry but followed by beneficial rains: 150mm but spread out over three episodes in a 10 day period. This was great because the soils were able to absorb the water; usually rain in the summer comes in the form of violent storms that hit all at once, eroding the soils and going straight into the gutter. 

We then went back to hot, sunny weather which kept up until harvest. We were hoping for some rain in mid-August, something that happens often and gives the grapes a much needed push in their maturation. Not this time...

By this point, you could see the youngest vines planted on coteaux and all top rows were clearly suffering from lack of water, some losing their foliage. While we waited for the rain, the grapes' maturities ended up getting there on their own. Our harvest started on August 24th. The sanitary state was perfect (no surprise with the lack of rain) with a lot of grapes from vines that had not suffered as badly as we'd expected (probably from the rains in June).

Unsurprisingly, the levels of acidity are fairly low.  The PH levels are fairly high but not quite the record breaking levels of 2003. Sugar was quite present, with potentials between 13 and 14%. Fermentations started well, helped by keeping the juices at an optimal cold temperature; the grapes and must would quickly creep up to 30° right before noon, so the cold cellar was essential. In fact we only harvested in the mornings so that I could avoid getting juices at higher temperatures (and preserve our harvest team!)

While we weren't necessarily expecting it, we did have some fermentation issues towards the end of the process. The alcoholic fermentation started slowing down and malolactic started before the sugars were fully transformed (low acidity+ high PH+ low sulfites = malo!). This was the case on almost all my vats; I was worried that I would see spikes in volatile acidity but in the end they actually are the lowest in the estate's history (these are the mysteries of vinification). At the time of this writing, not everything is finished, with many wines blocked with eight to nine grams of RS left, most notably Franclieu where I need to reactivate it to get to the four gram limit accepted by the appellation. 

All in all, I find the wines quite charming, retaining freshness (the malos are all done, that's exceptional at this time of year) and good structure. I believe this will be a vintage that can be enjoyed right at release. We'll have to confirm this in a few months...

2022 started with a very dry winter. Snow was rare, only in March did we see a little bit. Spring continued to be dry, with bud break starting in the first half of April; a regular time in this area. We got a decent amount of rain in June. Temperatures were normal until the beginning of July but then the Piana Rotaliana became a part of hell.

A very dry and hot summer began like in most parts of South-Western Europe. The rockier vineyards such as Morei had hydric stress issues, but most vineyards actually withstood the drought quite well. It was dramatic to see how some South-facing forests were really struggling and even started to lose their leaves. We had never experienced something like this before. Finally August brought back rain, which continued into September. Besides those two months, we had 35% less water compared to the average of the last 20 years.

Harvest started August 24th and ended September 28th.

Before August 10th, everything looked like a regular, early, climate-change vintage: fast sugar accumulations and a slow development of acidities. But something mystical happened between August 20th and August 27th: grapes accumulated three times more sugar than the norm, forcing us to make an ultra-fast picking of the whites. Overall,  Manzoni Bianco, Nosiola and the Pinot Grigio are on the riper side compared to 2021. But thanks to our reactivity, we kept the alpine character in the wines. Fermentations were fast and regular; the wines already show a crystal-clear brightness and a well-balanced opulence.

After such a fast start, we expected to continue with the reds. But the weather changed: cold nights and rain arrived and everything slowed to a crawl. The Teroldego's tannins stayed green and the grapes did not proceed to ripen. In the second half of September, there was a big change and we finally picked fully ripened fruit. We can already taste a certain polarity in this vintage for the reds. The fruit picked before September 21st shows freshness, while those picked later have a deeper and more defined structure.

Manzoni Bianco: definitely on the tropical, sunny-side of life. Already showing great drinkability now and a juicy character.

Nosiola: this vineyard loves heat and is definitely profiting from this warmer year. Deep and full.

Fuoripista: we were afraid about the hot summer. Pinot Grigio is a grape that has been suffering greatly from the changing climate, but we were surprised: the acidity stayed high and fits well with the rounder soul of this vintage.

Lezèr: in order to maintain the wine's crunchiness, we started harvesting for it in the last week of August. The wines are showing a fantastic, smooth balance already. This is a Lezèr-style vintage.

Foradori: it will be fun to figure out the final blend as we picked the potential 15 parcels at different ripening stages. We have everything from skinny expressions at 11% alcohol to muscular fruit bombs. We are excited to find the balance. 

Sgarzon: this was the most complicated vineyard to interpret this year. Although the grapes looked really nice and healthy, phenolic ripeness was really hard to achieve. It was the last vineyard we picked on September 28th.

Morei: a surprisingly slow fermentation this year which took its time. The wine is already very open. We will see how it develops.

Granato: the differences between the four potential Granato pergolas were huge. Pedot, usually providing the elegance in the blend, had a hard year and suffered the hot summer. Regin, which gives opulence, was very generous in every sense. Fermentations are not totally done yet; it started as quite the complicated year for Granato, but finally we are surprised about the balance in the wines.

All photos by Martin Errichiello:

All photos by Thomas Röttinger:

A Year of Extreme Conditions for the Vines:

The 2021-2022 winter was fairly mild, with above average temperatures. After a rather clement February, March and April alternated between rain and sunshine, an ideal accompaniment to wake the vines from their slumber. It also meant a precocious start to the vegetative cycle.

It was during this delicate period that two waves of frost swept our vineyards. On April 3rd and 4th, temperatures dropped down to -6°C, causing us some serious worries. There was a second frost in the night of April 9th into the 10th, this time less brutal. Luckily we did not have too much damage because for the most-part the vegetation wasn't advanced enough and the good weather that followed permitted us to keep the buds on the vines.

The ensuing warm weather restarted vegetation quickly. Bud-break took place in mid-April, two weeks early than a "normal" year. From May onward, we felt a hot, dry atmosphere begin to take hold. Though flowering took place without a hitch in late May, we were already worried about the impact of drought as temperatures were already unseasonably hot.

But June calmed things down and brought us some much needed rain, about 80mm falling in the second half of the month. We now had to focus on the risks of mildew, as bunches are particularly sensitive to it at this stage. Once again, our fears were unfounded: July's heat let the véraison take place in ideal conditions. 

The heat remained all the way up to harvest; through four major heat-waves, we now had to contend with the possibility of a blockage in maturities. We began picking early, but not as early as we'd anticipated, on September 6th. Around the flowering period, everything indicated we'd need to start in August. But the slow véraison rebalanced the grapes and permitted us to harvest a bountiful crop.

First Impressions of the Vintage:

The early juices announce a solar vintage that still conserves a good balance and the freshness we expect in the Loire. Quantity wise, after a difficult 2021, the volumes bring back a smile to our faces. 

The warm summer gave us optimal maturity in the grapes, all picked in a remarkable sanitary state. This really permitted the Pinot Noir's tannins to gain in finesse and concentration. The nose is leaning into red fruit and the tannins are well incorporated and and unctuous on the palate. 

For the Sauvignons, a fruit-forward quality is already showing through. You can taste the hot vintage yet the wine remains fresh. On the nose, white fruit and citrus dominate. 

2022 is a qualitative vintage!