Domaine du Haut Bourg, 2015 Update
Following on from my recent Muscadet Côtes de Grandlieu celebration, when I looked at some older vintages from a number of this appellation’s leading domaines, it is time to take a look at some younger wines. In this case, some of the wines are only marginally younger, as Nicolas and Hervé Choblet of Domaine du Haut Bourg have a penchant for long periods of lees-aging, with two of their cuvées regularly seeing five and ten years sur lie respectively. And the results are, on the whole, pretty smart; of all the top wines in the Muscadet Côtes de Grandlieu tasting, more than one or two were wearing the Domaine du Haut Bourg label.
I stopped off to taste more fully with Nicolas (pictured above – apologies for using this image again, but it is easily my favourite picture of Nicolas) and Hervé, working my way through the brut de cuve samples from the 2014 vintage, including both Muscadet and vin de pays cuvées (my notes on which can be found in my Muscadet 2014 report, and in my Domaine du Haut Bourg profile) before moving onto the bottled wines, on which I report below. Here I started with the 2013 vintage, first an attractive domaine cuvée, which shows appealing aromatics, the lightly iodine-salty streak particularly enticing, and then the 2013 Le Pavillon, a cuvée parcellaire which had richer notes of pear skin and powdered minerality.
Please log in to continue reading: