Geography

Savennières sits on the right (north) bank of the Loire in the Anjou region, just west of the city of Angers. The appellation is small — about 145 hectares — and concentrated on a single steep south-facing hillside above the river. The geology is schist, mica-schist, and volcanic phtanite (a flinty rock) — soils that are radically different from the tuffeau limestone of the rest of the middle Loire. The combination of steep south-facing exposure, schist-and-volcanic terroir, and Anjou’s relatively warm autumn climate produces a unique Chenin Blanc.

The wines

Savennières is 100% bone-dry Chenin Blanc — the appellation rules forbid sweet wine production. (Adjacent appellations like Coteaux du Layon make sweet Chenin from the same grape.) Two prestigious sub-appellations within Savennières: Roche-aux-Moines (Savennières-Roche-aux-Moines, granted its own AOC in 2011) and Coulée de Serrant (a single seven-hectare monopole owned by the Joly family — Savennières-Coulée de Serrant).

Style of the wines

Savennières Chenin Blanc: lemon, quince, beeswax, honey, wet wool, sometimes a flint-smoke note from the volcanic phtanite soils. The wines have remarkable structure for white wine — high acid, full body, glycerol-rich texture, sometimes austere in youth. Aged Savennières develops a famously honey-saffron-curry-spice tertiary complexity that few other dry whites can match. Alcohol typically 13-14%.

How they age

Top Savennières ages forty years routinely. Coulée de Serrant from a great vintage drinks at fifty-plus years and is one of the great long-aging dry whites in the world. The wines are often austere in their first decade and reward serious patience — Savennières at twenty years from vintage is dramatically different (and better) than Savennières at five.

Producers we know

Domaine de la Coulée de Serrant (the Joly family — biodynamic since 1980, one of the seminal biodynamic estates in France), Domaine du Closel, Domaine des Baumard, Château d’Épiré, Damien Laureau.