Chateau Tirecul La Graviere Selection de Grains Nobles, Monbazillac, Dordogne, France, 2022, 50cl

Grapes: A blend of 60% Semillon and 40% Muscadelle, old vines, 9ha vineyard on clay/limestone soil, organic, sustainable farming, manual harvest, 5-18hl/ha yield, indigenous yeast fermentation in barrel, minimum 12 months' ageing in French oak, 175g/L residual sugar (sweet)

Producer Tasting Note:

Intense richness and bright acidity. Driven by orange peel marmalade and saffron aromatics. In the mouth, it is rich and elegant with great length that lasts for minutes.

Estate: The critic Robert Parker described the wines of Tirecul as the most notable sweet wines from anywhere in the world. A lot is written about terroir, soil and microclimates. You often question how much of it is true, how do people know exactly why the wines work out the way they do? At Tirecul, however, you can really see it in front of you. There aren’t many estates where you can see all the vineyard in one block. At the bottom of the hill it is too open, and the top of the hill it is too windy. It’s only in two little pockets that the fog sits to create the conditions for some truly phenomenal botrytis wines. It’s a bit of a Goldilocks site, all the quirks of nature are ‘just right’. 

No one’s really sure why concentration comes from older vines (40+ years), but here it is in evidence. 90% of the vineyard is planted with an even split between Semillon and Muscadelle. The latter is a fascinating variety, often in the background, but it can be the real star of the show. The balance is Sauvignon Blanc and the recently allowed Chenin. The exact blend of the sweet wines is unknown because the grapes are picked when they are showing the best elements of botrytis and are co-fermented. 

Bruno Bilancini, who has run the estate since the early 1990s has, in the last few years, also produced very good dry white and red wines which are showing real promise.

Botrytis: The magic of Tirecul’s terroir allows Bruno to achieve the fragile balance needed for botrytis each year. The fungus attacks the grape skin, perforating it to penetrate into the grape. The water contained in the pulp of the grape can then evaporate. In colonising the pulp, it changes the colour and, more importantly the taste, leading to a concentration of sugar and a unique taste – a real sweet candy - enabling the production of these prestigious sweet white wines. Picking of the grapes is done on multiple, successive passes through the vineyard, and this exacting measure necessitates carefully choosing, sometimes grape by grape, those grapes and only those grapes that have reached an ideal state of botrytisation.

Food Match: It's got to be Foie Gras, but try it with a selection of blue cheeses (Roquefort, Fourme d’Ambert, Gorgonzola Piccante, Cashel Bleu), fruit based desserts, or simply as an aperitif