Le Retout Blanc, Two Vintages, 2014
It was mid-afternoon, during a brief window of opportunity in a busy schedule in Bordeaux, that I stopped off at Château du Retout. This château lies between Lamarque and Cussac-Fort-Médoc, in the no man’s land that stretches from Margaux in the south to St Julien to the north. It wasn’t a scheduled stop, so I was glad to see Frédéric Soual emerge from the tasting room when I pulled up outside.
Frédéric Soual (pictured) and his wife Hélène make here what is surely the most esoteric white wine in all Bordeaux, a blend of Gros Manseng, Sauvignon Gris, Savagnin and Mondeuse Blanche. Since first tasting the wine, in the 2011 vintage (there was a 2010, but volumes were in litres not hectolitres, and I haven’t tasted it), I have been entranced by the wine The story behind the wine is quite simple, yet courageous; Hélène and Frédéric were looking to replant a parcel, and realising they were working with rather unexciting clay soils they decided to spice things up a little bit by eschewing the usual Sauvignon Blanc and Semillon and opting instead for the quartet of distinctive cultivars listed above. The first few vintages have been hard going; the vines struggling to get established, and the yields have therefore been very low; happily, the 2013 vintage is a little better in terms of yield, but it is not yet at the 40-50 hl/ha level Frédéric would like to see.
I have already reported on the 2013 Le Retout Blanc in my Bordeaux 2013 en primeur report, and so I shall not reproduce my note here; nevertheless, I can’t let this very successful vintage go completely unmentioned. The 2013 has a very good potential in 2013, perhaps not surprising as it was a year that favoured the white wines, both dry and sweet. And happily for Hélène and Frédéric the yields were a little higher than the paltry 8.3 hl/ha, seen in 2011, and the similarly reduced crop in 2012. For more detail on the 2013 though, please see my 2013 AC Bordeaux report.
