Château de Targé Chinon De Targé Cabernet Franc 2018 (750ml)

 

Château de Targé

 

Chinon De Targé Cabernet Franc 2018

 

Overview:  After a massive attack of mildew in 2018 which ravaged the vineyard, then still in the midst of the transition to organic agriculture, the estate purchased grapes from Chinon from an excellent terroir.  This is a very typical Chinon in a sumptuous vintage.

 

Grape Variety:  100% Cabernet Franc

 

Tasting Notes

 

The wine is a beautiful garnet color.  Rich and fruit filled on the nose.  Ripe redcurrant and blackberry flavors, with hints of pepper and spice backed up with soft tannins.  Great with chicken, fish, BBQ, spicy Thai food and chili.

 

Food Pairings

 

This cuvee will adapt perfectly to slightly or strongly spiced cuisines, to grilled food accompanied by sauteed vegetables, or to winter dishes simmered for long hours.

 

Serving Temperature:  17°C

 

Vinification:  For this unique vintage, the harvest was done by hand and the winemakers used the same methods as for the Cuvee Ferry; the grapes are places in thermo-regulated steel vats for a cold maceration, followed by a temperature-controlled fermentation.  Very little pumping over in order to limit the extraction which was done by itself, several airings and rather low temperatures in order to seek the complexity, structure and power of these grapes.

 

Aging:  Aging is done in steel vats and the wine is bottled at the end of the following year.

 

Viticulture:  Worked and grassed soils, in the middle of bocage hedges and biodiversity zones recreated every year since 2005.  Strict controls have been imposed for the Terra Vitis labels since 2000, High Environmental Value since 2014, and organic agriculture since 2017.

 

Climate:  This well-draining plot is located on the north face of the Chinon hill, which allowed it to keep a lot of freshness despite the great heat of the 2018 vintage.

 

Soil:  Heavy clays and quartz sands on the surface on a limestone bed at a depth of 1.2 meters.

 

Chinon Wine

 

Chinon is the appellation covering wines produced around the historic town of Chinon, in the central Loire Valley.  This area has been producing wine for many centuries, and although wines of all three colors are made there, the focus is now very clearly on red wines.

 

The typical, quintessential Chinon wine is tannic, leafy, berry-scented and made from the Cabernet Franc grape variety.  Small quantities of crisp white Chenin Blanc wines are also made, but white and rosé wines account for just ten percent of total production in the appellation.

 

Chinon covers 26 communes in the Indre-et-Loire administrative department.  The region lies at the western end of the department, clustered for a radius of roughly 20km (12 miles) around Chinon town, on the southern (right) bank of the Loire iver as it flows east to west.

 

 

Château de Targé

 

In 1655, Phelippeaux de Ponchartrain, the personal secretary to King Louis XIV of France, acquired a hunting lodge near the forests of the Royal Abbey of Fontevraud, along with the hilltop next to it.  Since then, the property has been kept in the family, and each generation contributed to its construction and reputation.  Henri Allain-Targé brought French politicians of the 3rd Republic like Gambetta and Villemain to the Chateau.  Then, with the marriage of Geneviève Allain-Targé to Charles Ferry, brother of Jules Ferry (well known in France for his efforts in making school mandatory and free for all French youth), the Chateau became the privileged residence of the Ferry’s.  Fresnette – their only descendant – and her husband Edgard Pisani, then Minister under de Gaulle, together restored the Château after all the damage done by the two World Wars.

 

Their son, Edouard Pisani-Ferry, agricultural engineer in winemaking, inherited the Château in 1976.  He started by building a modern winery with thermo-regulated tanks, and then in the 1990’s expanded the vineyard by buying and exchanging terroirs in order to have the quality of land he thought the Château deserved.  During this time, he also started to utilize environment-friendly methods for cultivation and vinification.  Since 2000, he has been a member of the Terra Vitis association, which is committed to sustainable agriculture.  Today, the estate covers an area of about 24 hectares (60 acres).