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Clos Manou 2016

Two things drew me north last year, to Saint-Christoly-Médoc, on the windswept expanse of the Médoc peninsula. Both of them were Clos Manou.

I had first tasted the wines of Clos Manou a few years earlier, and being a regular visitor to Bordeaux I soon found myself tasting the wines every year, several times a year. And they always stood out, frequently among the top three or four wines I tasted from the northerly Médoc appellation, where ripening has traditionally been something of a challenge and wines with a rather ‘vegetal’ maturity are still, even with climate change upon us, not hard to find. But the wines of Clos Manou were clearly cut from a different cloth; they were full of savoury character, filled with dark fruit set within a dry structure, clearly ripe and yet they offer a contrast to the more modern, sweeter style of Bordeaux.

So my first purpose was to meet the proprietors behind these wines, Stéphane and Françoise Dief.

The second was to check out their vines, because I had heard the domaine was rich in old pieds planted perhaps 150 years ago. I write ‘perhaps’ because when vines are this old, nobody really knows for sure exactly when they were planted. I discovered the rumours to be based in fact. Stéphane owns a remarkable parcel of ancient pre-phylloxera vines; you can see images, and read more about these vines, in my profile of Clos Manou, which I wrote after my visit.

Stéphane and Françoise were not exactly born wearing a silver tastevin. Françoise’s family did own a few rows of vines, although they were not particularly active in making and selling wine, while Stéphane was carving out a career which emulated that of his father, as a courtier. Françoise’s brothers were working on the production side though, at Mouton-Rothschild and Rauzan-Ségla, in positions which meant they had access to good wines from a variety of the classed growths of the Médoc. Pouring these at family dinners had a profound effect on one person sitting at the table, and that person was Stéphane. Or Manou, as he is known to his friends.

Clos Manou 2016

The fact that somebody who has nothing – no history, no vines, no cellars – can still create a domaine from scratch and make a real go of it gives me hope. It can lead to profound success; in the Loire Valley, for example, it would be hard to find two more influential figures in Anjou than Richard Leroy and Mark Angeli, but both came into wine from other lives. But that is in the Loire Valley, where land – especially that in the less prestigious appellations – is relatively cheap, and there are opportunities for newcomers and dreamers. In Bordeaux such success must be rarer, yet in Stéphane, Françoise and Clos Manou, that is exactly what we have.

Stéphane and Françoise started with a 0.12-hectare parcel, and they made their inaugural vintage in 1998, in a tiny cellar in Saint-Christoly-Médoc. Their first crop filled two barrels, yielding just 600 bottles. But large trees from acorns do grow, and by 2002 they had acquired more vines, and more cellar space. And in 2003 they acquired something that, it could be argued, was even more valuable; a glowing review with a high score from a certain American critic, who was at the height of his powers. From this point on Stéphane and Françoise would never look back.

I won’t dive too deeply into the technical side of the business here, as there are two pages filled with viticultural and winemaking details in my profile. Suffice to say the domaine is close to organic, although Stéphane will not commit for fear of depending solely on copper-based treatments in warding off mildew, for fear of the effect this heavy metal has on the soils. The cellars, meanwhile, display a Dagueneau-esque level of cleanliness and order, and are lined with all the concrete eggs, sandstone jarres and glass wine globes the modern vigneron could wish for. They even have some barrels (remember those?).

A year on from this visit I was picking up some groceries in a store in Loudun, which despite its location just south of the Loire Valley offers a much greater range of classed growth Bordeaux and similar colossi of the right bank than it does Chinon, Vouvray or Sancerre. I find this mystifying, nevertheless browsing the shelves I chanced upon a bottle wearing the characteristic label of Clos Manou. Well, what else was I to do?

The 2016 Clos Manou is a blend of 50% Cabernet Sauvignon, 36% Merlot, 9% Petit Verdot and 5% Cabernet Franc; as a rough rule, the two Cabernets are vinified in wood, while the other two varieties see out their time in eggs and jarres (the globes are reserved for the old pre-phylloxera vines, and a separate cuvée). Once released from the bottle it displays a great colour, the dark and broad core quite opaque, encircled by a rich mulberry ring. Aromatically it is immediately savoury, just the sort of character I have found when tasting in Bordeaux and at the domaine last year, with notes of smoked blackcurrant, liquorice, black bean and black pepper. This translates into a rather velvety style on the palate, predictably dark and savoury, the lightly desiccated berry fruit here infused with dark chocolate and a richly extracted framework of dry and powdery tannins. It maintains this savoury substance and firm grip though into the cleanly defined finish. A dark, brooding, somewhat reticent and seriously structured wine this, one which demands more time in the cellar; hold another four or five years. The alcohol is declared as 13.5% on the label. 93/100 (26/8/24)

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