Geography

Vouvray sits along the Loire river in the Touraine region, just east of the city of Tours. The vineyards are planted on tuffeau — a soft chalky limestone that gives the appellation its name (and is also the foundation material for the famous Loire châteaux). The tuffeau is honeycombed with caves that have been used for cellaring wine since the Middle Ages. The river-and-tuffeau combination produces a unique microclimate that’s particularly hospitable to Chenin Blanc and to botrytis development in autumn.

The styles

Vouvray is 100% Chenin Blanc — but can be vinified in five distinct styles depending on the vintage and the producer’s choice: Sec (bone-dry, 0-8 g/L residual sugar), Demi-Sec (off-dry, 8-18 g/L), Moelleux (sweet, 18-45 g/L), Doux (very sweet, 45+ g/L, often botrytized), and sparkling Vouvray Brut or Mousseux (made by the traditional method). The same vineyard, in the same vintage, can produce any or all of these styles.

Style of the wines

Vouvray Chenin Blanc: quince, white peach, beeswax, honey, white flower, sometimes a slightly green apple bite in the drier styles. The acid is bright to high (a hallmark of Chenin) and keeps even the sweetest wines from feeling cloying. Aged Vouvray develops the famously distinctive ‘wet wool’ character along with deeper honey-and-marzipan notes. The sparkling Vouvray bottlings are some of the best traditional-method sparkling wines outside Champagne.

How they age

Top Vouvray Moelleux and Doux from a great vintage ages fifty years routinely. Domaine Huet’s Cuvée Constance (made only in exceptional vintages) from 1947 and 1959 is still drinking remarkably. Even Vouvray Sec from a serious producer ages twenty-plus years and develops a honeyed, savory tertiary complexity that has earned legitimate comparison to aged Riesling.

Producers we know

Domaine Huet (the historical reference — Le Mont, Le Haut-Lieu, Clos du Bourg are the three signature single-vineyard sites), François Chidaine (technically based in neighboring Montlouis but bottles serious Vouvray), Domaine Foreau (Clos Naudin), Domaine Champalou, Vincent Carême, Domaine du Closel.