2017 Le Clos

Vincent Carême grew up on this estate, but as a young man he went abroad and worked in several harvests in South Africa, where he met his wife Tania Van Zijl. He returned to the family estate in 1999 and now oversees 17 hectares, with half the production for sparkling and half for still wines. The estate was certified organic in 2010, and over the past few years Vincent has converted to biodynamic farming. Some of his very best wines are off-dry, but he has been reluctant to bottle them as “demi-sec” — a modern dilemma in Vouvray. He chooses instead to use the word tendre. “In France, a lot of people don’t like demi-sec, and so the word is not good commercially,” he said. “Tendre is more attractive.”