Winemaker of the storied family-run estate: “Passion isn’t something you can pass down”.
Our next interview in Le Figaro Vin’s series finds us in the Northern Rhône, where we meet Jean-Louis Chave, who stands at #8 in the rankings, a winemaker perpetuating not only his family’s legacy but that of an entire region.
The sixteenth generation in a long line of winemakers, Jean-Louis Chave has proven to be a worthy successor. His wines, known for their precision and purity, express all the character of the Hermitage terroir. During the 1990s, the Rhône winemaker set himself a new goal: to reinvest in the Bachasson hillside, located in Saint-Joseph, the very place where the family’s ancestors began their viticultural journey. From the start of his career, Jean-Louis Chave turned to practices of days past to tend to his vineyard. Long before receiving the certification it holds today, the estate was already employing organic methods. However, the winemaker does not want to rest on the laurels of his success, in France and around the world, but remains on a relentless quest for perfection. Through this interview, we meet with a man of remarkable humility.
Le Figaro Vin: How does it feel to be crowned a winemaking champion?
Jean-Louis Chave – This achievement is thanks to the terroirs that we represent, and we strive to live up to their standards. The winemaker is entirely reliant on the terroir – there is no great winemaker without great terroir.
Have you been training for long?
For us, it’s a family affair, as I’m a sixteenth-generation winemaker. This makes me think about the question of transmission, which I’ve often thought about and continue to think about now I have children.
What are we passing down?
You can pass down a profession, and all its ways of working, but passion isn’t something you can pass down. I started working in the vines in 1992 or 1993, it’s been 30 years now. This is a long-term commitment, the practice of winemaking. An athlete will try to repeat an achievement or try to improve on it in a short amount of time, but us winemakers, we need to wait a cycle, an entire year, to express ourselves again. Rather than speaking of training, I prefer to think of it in terms of interpreting the terroir. To really achieve this, you must understand it, and this takes time.
Who is your mentor?
My father, definitely. But also, the wine enthusiasts who follow our approach, to whom we have a sense of responsibility, a duty of excellence.
Is wine a team sport?
Yes, especially in our region, where the vineyards are planted on steep slopes, and are cultivated the same way my ancestors cultivated them, without any machinery. We think of ourselves as “gardener-winemakers”. You need one and a half people per hectare of vines, whereas, in other regions, one person can easily cover 12 to 15 hectares.
What is the key to making a good wine? The terroir or the team?
What counts is the terroir. The winemaker is just an interpreter. They mustn’t damage what Nature has given them; they are there to accompany the terroir to its fullest expression, which is the wine they will make from it.
To what do you owe your success?
To our good fortune in having certain terroirs that have been in our family for a very long time. We also owe it to our philosophy of a job well done, and to our craftsmanship that has developed over the years, always driven by the idea of continuous improvement.
Is your father proud of you? And your children?
With my father, I think the pride goes both ways, the satisfaction of seeing the story continue to unfold. As for my children, I don’t want to force them to be part of our story, of our profession. It needs to come from them. That’s another philosophy we’ve always embraced: that our story, no matter how long, can end, or transform itself. The Hermitage was here before us, and whatever happens, it will be here long after us.
Who has been your biggest sponsor throughout your career?
The world of wine enthusiasts, the people who encourage us in our work. Wine exists when it is enjoyed, when it conveys an emotion, a reaction. These emotions, these reactions, they encourage us to keep telling our story. Restaurateurs also play a very important role because they give life to our wines.
Your favourite colour?
The gradient of greens you find in the natural world, and the blue of the sky. As for wines, you can’t separate what you drink from what you eat, so the colour is going to depend on the dish. Ideally, you would pick a wine and adapt the dish to it. Unfortunately, we are living in a time where chefs receive a lot of media attention, which means wine often plays second fiddle.
Your favourite variety?
Our form of expression is Syrah for the reds, Marsanne and Rousanne for the whites. I can’t say I prefer Syrah to Marsanne, it’s like being asked to pick your favourite child. The variety matters little, what really matters is the terroir. The variety is the prism through which the terroir is expressed.
Your favourite cuvée?
Historically, at the estate, our favourite cuvées have been Hermitage wines. It’s my generation’s mission to give a certain importance to another appellation which is hard to define, but very captivating: Saint-Joseph. We are trying to raise the bar.
Your three favourite vintages?
I would say 1991, a vintage that has fully matured, and that embodies what a great wine of Hermitage should be.
If your wine was a person, who would it be?
I would want it to be someone who resembles the terroir it hails from. When you make a wine, you think of its hills, of its landscapes. What I want is for people, when they taste our wine, to recognise a piece of its birthplace. For those who don’t know our terroirs, I hope they find the harmony, the softness, the strength, and the colours that characterise the great wines of Hermitage.
What’s the best way to enjoy it?
The best way to discover our wine is always with food, whether it’s at a restaurant, or sitting around a table at home.
Have you ever thought about chemically enhancing your estate?
What is chemical enhancement? Adding a bit of sugar, a bit of tartaric acid, the tannins brought by oak? What counts, is remaining true to yourself, and true to the wine. Wine must be natural, not in the sense that it’s free from additives, but in the sense that it must be true, sincere. It takes work, despite all this, to ensure wine is its truest expression, in relation to its origins and to what it should be. You can’t take a hands-off, laissez-faire approach, because without any intervention, wine would be vinegar! It’s a fine line: you must stay close to the purest of truths, but that isn’t going to happen automatically. At the estate, everything is organised so we can do as little as possible, but we sometimes need to accompany the wine so it can express itself fully.
For what price would you be prepared to sell your estate?
Everything is meant for the estate to remain in the family, but should that not be the case, we will probably sell, and this sale will be its own kind of transmission. It won’t be a question of price, because the most important question is knowing who will be taking on the estate and turning a new leaf in its story.
What is your greatest achievement?
The vine-covered slopes of Saint-Joseph, including one that belonged to my family from 1481 until the phylloxera epidemic in 1880. My ancestors worked on those steep slopes for almost 400 years and were forced to abandon them without really understanding what was happening. I’m proud of having been able to replant them, over 100 years later. They are located close to a town called Bachasson, next to a place known as Chave. I started this long-term project in 1995, and the last vines were replanted in 2007.
What has been your most innovative strategy in the vineyard and in the cellar?
My most innovative strategy has been working just as they did back in the day. When I first started, people would tell me: “You work like they did in the olden days.” At the time, what was groundbreaking was knowing all the names of the chemical molecules, or working with chemistry, whereas now, if you’re working with chemistry you’re stuck in the olden days! I’ve been interested in biodynamics for 15 years. I had counterparts and friends in other regions that followed biodynamic principles – Aubert de Villaine (previously co-manager of Domaine de la Romanée-Conti, ed.) for example. I can’t explain why, but I feel like this method works.
Who would be your ideal successor on the podium?
There is no hierarchy: it could be a young, passionate winemaker who does their job right, with a bright future. Every winemaker who does their job right deserves all the recognition they get.
With Burgundy en primeur coming to a close – and such a good array of 2018s to choose from at that – fine wine collectors might feel inclined to tighten their purse strings over the coming months (perhaps until the next big campaign to come – Bordeaux 2019 en primeur). For those unable to resist the temptation of continuing to grow their wine collection, the Rhône is a perfect resting place for high-quality drinking wines.
This week we focus on a subset of Rhône MUST BUYs – those under £100 per bottle in-bond (when bought by the case), with WL scores above 95, of which there are 36.
Châteauneuf-du-Pape wins the lion’s share of top Rhône MUST BUYs under £100, with 18 entries across eight different vintages. The exceptional 2016 vintage features heavily, however for wines drinking now, 2005 Beaurenard’s CNDP Boisrenard or 2009 Clos des Papes’ CNDP are particularly interesting options.
Hermitage too fairs well, with five reds and all four whites. Value Picks 2007 Colombier Hermitage and 2004 Ferraton Ermitage Le Méal provide impressive quality and bottle age for just £33 and £35 per bottle in-bond respectively (if you can get your hands on any).
Côte Rôtie matches in number for reds, and features Hidden Gem 2012 Côte Rôtie Rose Pourpre from Pierre Gaillard, which Wine Lister partner critic, Jancis Robinson, awards 18 points, commenting, “No doubt this is a very special cuvée”.
A consistent feature throughout is Maison Tardieu-Laurent – a powerhouse producer of reference for quality matched by exceptional value in the Rhône.
See the selection of Rhône MUST BUYs featured above here, or browse the full MUST BUY selection.
This week’s “top five” blog is a first for Wine Lister, as we analyse the highest-Quality wines of a single producer, Michel Chapoutier. Readers should note that this is simply an analysis exercise, and not a paid advertisement (albeit a shining review of Chapoutier, given how high the Quality scores are).
In first place of this week’s top five, perhaps surprisingly, is a white wine – Chapoutier’s Ermitage Blanc L’Ermite, with a Quality score of 966. Not only does this make it the highest-quality white Rhône on Wine Lister, but also the second highest-quality wine from the Northern Rhône overall, beaten only by Jean-Louis Chave’s Hermitage Cuvée Cathelin. The 2015 earns 94-96 points from Wine Lister partner critic, Vinous, with Josh Raynolds commenting on its “outstanding focus and persistence”. While outperforming its siblings for Quality, it also earns the highest average price of the group, at over £300 per bottle in-bond.
Next up is the first red of the group, Ermitage Le Pavillon, with a Quality score of 956. Wine Lister partner critic, Jancis Robinson, awards the 2016 vintage an impressive 19 points, naming it a “polished and pure Hermitage”. It also earns the group’s best Brand score of 897, appearing in 15% of the world’s best restaurants and ranking in 266th place for Wine-Searcher searches among the c.4,000+ wines on Wine Lister.
In joint-third place comes the second red of the group, Ermitage Le Méal, and Chapoutier’s sweet white, Ermitage Vin de Paille. Both achieve a Quality score of 945, however they are distinctive not just in their respective styles, but also in their Brand scores. Le Méal is clearly the better-known, with a Brand score of 724 and a search rank of 710, compared with the Vin de Paille’s Brand score of 593 (the lowest of this week’s top five), and a search rank of 2088. Interestingly however, the Vin de Paille’s presence in the world’s top restaurants is the better, if only by 1% (6% vs. 5% for Ermitage Le Méal).
Rounding out Chapoutier’s top five for Quality is the Ermitage L’Ermite, with a Quality score of 941. Despite its position at the bottom of the group, it achieves the highest Quality score at vintage level for the 2010 (992). The Ermitage L’Ermite 2010 achieves 95+ points from Wine Lister partner critic, Vinous, and though Josh Raynolds calls it “remarkably long, chewy, smoke- and spice-accented…”, he also warns it “should be stashed away and forgotten for a good long while”.
Price and price performance have been hot topics for Wine Lister’s recent blog posts across several regions (Burgundy, Champagne, Tuscany). The Rhône Valley flies further under the radar than these as a region for investment, perhaps in part because its two distinct vineyard areas – North and South – are too different to be cast under the same umbrella. This week’s top five examines the highest prices in the Northern Rhône.
In first place is Domaine Jean-Louis Chave’s Hermitage Cuvée Cathelin. With an average price of £5,248 (per bottle in-bond), it is almost 20 times more expensive than the average of the other four wines in this week’s group. The small quantity of wine, made only in the best years, combined with a Quality score of 977 – the best of this week’s top five – go some way to explaining the four-figure price tag. (Interestingly, the most expensive wine in the Southern Rhône, Buzz Brand Château Rayas’ Chateauneuf-du-Pape, costs an average of £478, or just 9% of the Cuvée Cathelin).
Back in the Northern Rhône, the next of this week’s top five is Domaine Jamet’s Côte Rôtie Côte Brune. Although £4,926 less expensive than this week’s number one, at £322 per bottle in-bond, it actually achieves the best three-year price performance, with a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 24.7%. With an average production volume of just 2,400 bottles per year, it is perhaps unsurprising that the wine’s Brand and Economics scores (at 763 and 759 respectively) are lower than its Quality score (946), as it appears in only 8% of the world’s best restaurants, and just three bottles were traded at auction internationally last year.
The remaining wines of this week’s top five hail from the same producer, Guigal, and come as a trio affectionately-known to the trade as “La-Las”. Though close together in price, it is interesting to see the subtle differences between these three Côte Rôtie across Wine Lister’s 13 score criteria.
The chart above, created using Wine Lister’s Comparison tool, proves La Turque to be the lowest-scoring of the three overall. It shows slightly less demand with a lower search rank of 199 out of the c.4,000 wines on Wine Lister, whereas its siblings earn more monthly searches on Wine-Searcher. It also under-performs against the other two in economic terms, with lower long- and short-term price growth, and fewer bottles traded annually at auction.
By contrast, La Landonne achieves the top Quality score of 963 (and an average wine life just under twice that of its siblings), the best brand strength, and the highest average number of bottles traded annually at auction (478).
While La Mouline has the lowest average price of the three (£250 per bottle in-bond), it is the only one to earn Wine Lister’s Buzz Brand stamp, and achieves the joint-best three-year price performance with La Landonne – a CAGR of 9%.
Often overlooked in favour of Burgundy’s top whites, the Rhône’s counterparts should not be forgotten, particularly if you’re looking for a rich style at a more reasonable price. Whilst the Rhône’s top five dry whites for Quality can’t match the scores of Burgundy’s top chardonnays (930 vs 977), they are nearly 30 times cheaper on average (£126 vs £3564). Within the Rhône, in the battle of North vs South it is the former that comes out on top, with four expressions of Hermitage featuring in the top five.
Leading the way is Chapoutier’s Ermitage Blanc L’Ermite (966). By far the most expensive of the five, it is particularly favoured by Bettane+Desseauve, the French duo awarding it an outstanding average score of 19/20. It is also the longest-lived of the group, alongside Domaine Chave’s Hermitage Blanc, with an average drinking window of 12 years. Despite its outstanding Quality score, it experiences the lowest overall Wine Lister score of the group (799), its Brand and Economics scores failing to keep pace (659 and 666 respectively).
In contrast to Chapoutier’s L’Ermite, Domaine Chave’s Hermitage backs up its excellent Quality score with the best Brand and Economics scores of any Rhône white (930 and 873), propelling it to first place in terms of overall Wine Lister score (927). It is Vinous’ favourite of the five, with an average score of 95/100, helped by a score of 97-99 for the 2015, Josh Reynolds stating that it shows “a remarkable interplay of depth, power and energy that I only occasionally encounter with the very best white Burgundies”.
Interrupting Hermitage’s hegemony is Beaucastel’s Châteauneuf-du-Pape Roussanne Vieilles Vignes (917). Proving that the appellation’s best whites can compete with their red counterparts, it outperforms Beaucastel’s straight Châteauneuf-du-Pape in the Quality category (917 vs 876). However it can’t quite beat the domaine’s flagship Hommage à Jacques Perrin (962), but at under a third of the price (£81 vs £255) it does look better value.
Two more Hermitages round out the group, another from Chapoutier – Le Méal Blanc – and, impressively, one from Chave’s négociant label – Hermitage Blanche – each with a Quality score of 909.