La Ferme de la Sansonnière 2021-2023, plus Superb Anjou from Chateau de Plaisance!
A chemistry student turned stonemason, Mark Angeli of La Ferme de la Sansonniere fell for wine, changed career and moved to Anjou, in 1989 in search of affordable lands to develop his ideal vision of agriculture. In the schistous foothills of the noble rot heaven, Bonnezeaux, he luckily stumbled upon the Ferme de La Sansonnière, an historic and polycultural property, then selling conventional wines to the local supermarkets, that was for sale. He jumped on the opportunity, and right away converted the farm to Biodynamics.
After years of making celebrated Bonnezeaux, Angéli decided to reverse course, and make great dry (or semi-dry) wines from most of his plots, even in Bonnezeaux. Thus was created his Anjou blanc “La Lune”, which has the deep gold color of a sweet Chenin, and notes of dried, candied fruit on the nose; the mouth is rich, despite its minerality and lively acidity; the wine is totally dry, but with the weight and flavors of a moëlleux: in all, quite an astonishing feat of vinegrowing and winemaking.
If the wines have been brilliant benchmarks for Chenin on schist, they are reaching today a new level thanks to the energetic return of Martial, Mark’s son and the arrival of Bruno Ciofi, ex-manager of Domaine de la Pinte in the Jura. More than ever, the trio of farmer-peasants is experimenting with agroforestry, regenerative farming, ungrafted vines, gobelet and echalas pruning, rehabilitation of forgotten varieties (like grolleau blanc), amphora and homeopathic uses of volcanic sulfur. They farm currently 7.5 ha of mostly chenin and a little grolleau (blanc, gris and noir), surrounded by fields for horses, sheep, beehives, cows, cartham (for the oil), wheat (for the flour), fruit trees (for biodiversity and delicious juice).
The wines are rare and beautiful - please share: Max 2 btls La Lune, 1 btl of single vineyards, please!
[Vanessa Cherruau of Chateau de Plaisance]
Vanessa Cherruau is now a steward of one of the Loire’s great terroirs – Chaume. After finishing wine school in Angers, she worked throughout the wine industry for 12 years before befriending the Rochais family on the Chaume hill, who owned Chateau de Plaisance (more a farmhouse than Chateau) and its 25 ha of vines growing on the schist bedrock of the appellation. With plans to sell the historic estate to the local cooperative, Vanessa convinced the family to sell to her instead, allowing her to continue the fine legacy they left, while forging a new path for Loire greatness. Luckily for Vanessa, she inherited some of the most well-cared for vines on the hill, as Plaisance has been certified organic since 1995 and certified Biodynamic since 2008. She of course has continued the Biodynamic viticulture started by her predecessors, knowing that taking care of the natural environment of the vines is of utmost importance. Since her first vintage in 2019, she has helped raise the image of dry Chenin made on the Chaume hill to where it is now one of the most interesting terroirs in the Loire. (thanks to importer Michael Skurnik)
As Mark Angeli has done in Bonnezeaux, Vanessa Cherruau is making great dry Chenin from the sweet wine appellations of Chaume and Quarts de Chaume, labeled simply as Anjou. The name "Ronceray" is used for dry wines from these crus, and may soon have an official designation. We urge you to try these beautiful wines!
"Plaisance is committed in a comprehensive manner to the protection of the environment and biodiversity, towards a carbon footprint that is as neutral as possible. If making wine is what drives me the most, my desire to do so with impeccable social and environmental ethics is limitless." - Vanessa Cherruau
