2013 Sancerre Comtesse

I found much to admire in these new releases (and a few older vintages) from Gérard Boulay. These are relatively open-knit Sancerres that are gently shaped by a light touch of oak that softens the contours but without being especially intrusive otherwise.

Gerard Boulay is a very humble, quiet man in his early 60s who four years ago moved his cellar out of the village of Chavignol in order to have more space to handle the crop from his 12 hectares of vines. With four workers assisting him in the vineyards, he has done an excellent job over the past couple of years to delineate the style of each of his sites. All are harvested by hand and fermented with wild yeasts in 300-liter oak barrels, but you never taste the wood as you often do in the wines of his colleagues. Given the steep slopes, he seldom has problems with botrytis, but alcohol levels can rise in warmer vintages if he is not careful. The 2013s portrayed below were tasted with him from tank, the 2012s from bottle. Given the crystalline purity of his sauvignon blancs, he has become one of my favorite producers of the central Loire. If you want to know what true Sancerre tastes like, try one of his single-vineyard bottlings. It does not come any better! Further, even the entry-level wine that he calls Tradition, which represents half of his total production, offers excellent value for money.