Michel Chapoutier is a global icon of the wine trade. Arriving to take over his family wine company in 1990, the wines of M.Chapoutier were very much part of the crest of the wave that has seen the explosion in interest for the wines of the Rhône Valley in recent decades. From their base in Tain L’Hermitage, Michel and his team now produce wines from nearly every major appellation of both the Northern and Southern Rhône and can rightly be seen as benchmarks for quality, whatever AOC is on the label.
Within this all-encompassing range sit the lauded Sélections Parcellaires. This range of selected single vineyard wines are the unofficial Grand Crus of all the lieux-dits at Chapoutier’s disposal. The marketing material reads that these are “exceptional, rare wines created from the oldest vines with tiny yields, with a limited production of only 100 to 700 cases.” Well in that case, you can begin to understand why the fine wine collectors get so excited each time the new vintage gets released En Primeur.
This April, Michel’s son and head of production, Maxime, was in town to reveal all with a guided tasting of 2023 barrel samples. As well as discussing the vintages and the development of recent projects in both Alsace and Roussillon, it was a chance for Maxime to remind us of the ethos behind these unique wines.
“The Selections Parcellaires is not trying to make the best wines in the world,” revealed Chapoutier, “it’s about showing off our best terroir and being expressive of the vintage.”
2023 in the Rhône Valley
The hill of Hermitage
The 2023 vintage began at slow pace, with a lack of water and mild temperatures seeing slow bud burst throughout the vineyards. July and August, however, brought a spike in temperature that speeded up ripening and kept Chapoutier’s “harvest strike force” on alert from the middle of August onwards.
“We have all kinds of technology that can help us assess when to pick,” explained Chapoutier, “but this was really a vintage where you had to get out into the vines, taste the grapes and trust your instincts.”
Despite the record-breaking heat in the middle of the summer, the volume of fruit harvested gave the team a lot of hope for the balance of the wines to come.
“Hail hit hard in St Péray and Cornas, otherwise yields were pretty good everywhere else,” noted Chapoutier. “This has really helped with the acidity.”
The balance in the wines is also attributed to the group’s famous advocacy of biodynamic practices.
“We’ve been biodynamic for 20 years now,” remembered Chapoutier. “Our vineyards are covered in bio-indicative plants, which has helped take our understanding of our vineyards to the next level.”
He cited recent purchases of previously commercial sites with only 10 different plant species. The biodynamic vineyards, in contrast, have 75-80 showing the diversity of life and organic matter in soils.
The white wines of 2023
We began the tasting with the Les Granits Blancs, AOC Saint-Joseph, 2023, an appellation for which M.Chapoutier has a long standing affection.
“After the enlargement, Saint-Joseph is second biggest AOC,” lamented Chapoutier. “But our vineyard is scattered with Granit de Tournon, making the wines so very different and unique.”
The love of Marsanne really comes to the fore here, with the natural bitterness of these old vines making up for any supposed lack of natural acidity to provide the freshness. Delicious stone and tropical fruit, grippy saline notes, almonds, and a rounded mouthfeel, with tangy marmalade bitterness adding freshness, to the long, coating finish.
Next came the triumvirate of white wines from the famous hill of Hermitage.
“These 136 hectares showcase the richness of diversity of the soils in such a small place,” explained Chapoutier. “In one hill we can see the full geological history of the Northern Rhône.” The De L’Orée, AOC Hermitage 2023 comes from the bottom sites, heavy with iron clay. Known as ‘loving clay’ for how much it sticks to your shoes the Marsanne here is very vibrant, with the wine full of deep notes of roasted corn, caramel, honeysuckle, and fennel, perfect in 5-7 years.
Further up the hill on the alluvial terraces comes the famed Le Méal site, where Chapoutier proudly produce the lieux-dit’s only white wine.
“It was all white wine here before phylloxera,” pointed out Chapoutier. “Our mission is to get back that tradition of white in that region.”
Le Méal, AOC Hermitage 2023 is a delight, with deeper straw colour, and heavy with smoke, almonds, apricots, citrus, sage, and white pepper. Might need a couple of decades to show its best.
The exquisite L’Ermite, AOC Hermitage 2023 is grown at the crest of the hill, at 320m above sea level, and looking down on the rest of the valley.
“The altitude means the vines are always aerated” mentioned Chapoutier. The potential for extra freshness was vital as June and July brought a massive heat wave, hotter than any other year. “We tied the vines together for a natural cap to shadow the grapes,” gestured Chapoutier, “but we still needed those winds to come through.” Luckily, that’s exactly what happened, and the resulting wine is heady with depth, balance and complexity, blossom, spice, and a fresh saline, citrus, stony finish. Exceptional.
“It might not have felt like it at the time,” mused Chapoutier, “but 2023 has the potential to be one of the best vintages for whites in the Northern Rhone.”
The red wines of 2023
We began with Les Varonniers, AOC Crozes-Hermitage, 2023. Sometimes viewed as an 'up-and-down' appellation, this wine sees the Chapoutier team stick to the terroir in the steep, western-orientated part of the appellation. The steep slopes from 120-350m cover the Varognes and Maysonniers plots.
“We aim for less extraction here,” explained Chapoutier. “Wine is only good if you can finish the whole bottle, not just the glass!”
The classic, structured Syrah saw only three weeks of maceration, with two gentle pump-overs a day to wet the cap. The wine was finished for 16 months in barrels, with a touch of large foudre creeping in to fit the modern thinking. This is supremely fresh and rounded in the mouth, with all those young violet, blueberries, and spicy black fruits you want from a classic Syrah.
Next to the amphitheatre of Cornas to taste the Saint-Pierre, AOC Cornas, 2023. This young vineyard sits on the top of the appellation, with 100% granite soils, resulting in classic, fresh Syrah due to the higher altitude. This wine was much more direct, tight, stony, mineral, with excellent tannic structure and liquorice bitterness in the finish. Expect it to age beautifully for a decade or more.
The Neve, AOC Côte-Rôtie, 2023 was produced from a masale selection of ancient Serein berries. The Chapoutier team likes the extra concentration in the grapes.
“One week after harvest we already had great colour and depth,” beamed Chapoutier. “This could be one of best vintages for Côte Rôtie.” The wine already has incredible fruit and flavour concentration, but coupled with a fresh, herbal tinge throughout. This might well have been my pick of the while tasting.
Now to the four stunning single vineyard wines of Chapoutier's Hermitage holdings. Les Greffieux, AOC Hermitage, 2023 is seen as the “Piemonte of Hermitage”. Based at the bottom of hill, the higher clay proportion means vines never suffer water stress. With concentrated ripe red, black and jammy notes, but without the 'warmth' ever out of balance, this felt like the most finished wine of the day. The Le Méal, AOC Hermitage 2023 is a combination of the bottom of the plot giving more flesh and power and the top of the plot giving ore fruit. The result is a sweeter tasting wine, with distinct blood orange notes at this young stage.
Le Pavillon, Hermitage, 2023 is from the plot the Chapoutier team believes is the birthplace of Syrah. Big crystals of granite, gives tighter tannin than at the top hills; slightly shallower soils than Ermite have also given this wine a distinct meaty, rich, and tannic quality with excellent bitter liquorice notes, violet flower and a fabulous density and depth.
The L’Ermite, AOC Hermitage, 2023 itself was arguably the toughest one to taste. Yes, there were soft, round, fleshy notes of lifting violets, rose, grippy tannin, tightness and freshness, but this wasn’t what this wine is all about.
“You really can’t drink this young. It needs at least 20 years to become anywhere near its potential,” stated Chapoutier. “But when it’s there, my father likes to say it tastes like the summer rain!”
The Alsace project
The M.Chapoutier group has been in Alsace for 15 years now.
“Back in 2000, after a night of drinking, my father and his friends declared they thought Riesling was the most interesting white grape in France,” related Chapoutier. “After eight generations in the Rhône we felt we knew Marsanne, but Riesling? Luckily we found blue schist in Bernardvillé, so we can perform the same viticulture, same winemaking, it’s just a new grape.”
2023 was the first vintage in the new Schieferkopf winery and with the release of 3 Sélections Parcellaires wines, it’s clear the team feels like it has now hit the quality it's been aiming for. The vintage itself saw a very wet March followed by a heavy heat wave in July and August. A year that demanded plenty of adapting ended with fabulous balance in the ripe grapes as the late season's diurnal range preserved some great low pHs in the grapes.
Although they refrain from oak ageing, the use of concrete eggs gives a touch of reduction on the lees, and a proportional use of malolactic conversion give a very distinct fullness to the character of these Rieslings.
“Alsace style with MLC was new,” remembers Chapoutier. “We were very much seen as foreigners, but we felt Alsace needed new styles.”
The Schieferkopf, Buehl Riesling, 2023 comes from steep, south-orientated slopes, 300-350m high, but with deep soils for water retention. This is a generous Riesling, with sharp blood orange notes and a coating, almost umami mouth feel. Higher up is the Schieferkopf, Berg Riesling, 2023 from 350-400m slopes. It’s here that the dry, saline style comes to the fore.
“We don’t want much residual sugar,” explained Chapoutier. “Yes it can balance acidity, but it can also mask terroir specifics.”
And finally the Schieferkopf, Fels Riesling, 2023 from poor soils up at 450m, always exposed to the wind with full eastern exposure giving higher levels of acidity, in the leanest and most vertical expression of the three.
The high slopes of Roussillon
Having myself just returned from a trip to Roussillon, it was great to finish this tasting with the wines of M.Chapoutier’s Domaine de Bila-Haut.
“We like to see it as the little sister of the Rhône valley,” added Chapoutier. “It was planted about the same time, around 2000-3000 years ago, with similar rivers and winds, mountain ranges, and business set-up. It’s been a great addition.”
The two Sélection Parcellaire wines come from two of Roussillon’s named villages, meaning some seriously impressive word counts on the names. Domaine de Bila-Haut, V.I.T., AOC Côtes-Du-Roussillon Villages Latour de France, 2023 is a mix of 65% Grenache, 35% Syrah. Although a dry 2023 saw less than 300mm of rainfall, a very useful diurnal range meant the wine is still fleshy and floral, with ripe red, blue, and black fruits, liquorice and pepper spice and chewy, ripe tannins.
The Domaine de Bila-Haut, R.I., AOC Côtes-Du-Roussillon Villages Lesquerde, 2023 is back to 100% Syrah, only possible due to the extra 300m in altitude compared to Latour de France. “It reminds us a bit of Hermitage,” mused Chapoutier. “100% Syrah, with both on granite soils giving sharpness and sapidity.” The wine itself was a classy Syrah, full of ripe blue and black fruits, violet, liquorice, pepper, rosemary, rounded tannins, and a rich, coating mouthfeel.
The 2023 Sélections Parcellaire range is available now En Primeur via Hatch Mansfield, which is a commercial partner of The Buyer. To discover more about them click here.
For full pricing and availability, please contact your sales representative directly, or email info@hatch.co.uk.
For more information on the world and wines of M.Chapoutier, please visit their website here or contact Rosamund Barton at R&R Teamwork on rosamund@randr.co.uk
Mike Turner is a freelance writer, presenter, educator, judge and regular contributor for The Buyer.
