Domaine Vacheron

The Free Bacchus Story

Sancerre is one of the most recognised wine names in the world, which is precisely why so little of it is interesting. A name that sells reliably attracts volume, and volume rarely rewards the extra work.

Domaine Vacheron is where serious Sancerre drinkers go first. The cousins Jean-Laurent and Jean-Dominique Vacheron have farmed biodynamically since 1999 and joined Biodyvin in 2004, and the estate's 48 hectares of Sauvignon Blanc and Pinot Noir are managed as an integrated system. The limestone and silex soils respond unusually well: the flinty minerality that defines great Sancerre is amplified by keeping soil biology active and roots deep, rather than invented in the cellar.

About a quarter of the vineyard is red — twelve hectares of Pinot Noir. Planting a quarter of a famous white appellation to Pinot Noir is a commercial decision almost nobody makes.

Belle Dame, first bottled on its own in 1995, and Les Romains, in 1997, began the single-vineyard range; Stephan Reinhardt at Wine Advocate called the 2017 Belle Dame a Pinot Noir of impressive concentration, freshness and finesse. The Pinot Noir is the genuine sleeper — among the most compelling red wine in the Loire, with a Burgundian precision that reflects the same farming, and consistently undervalued because the appellation's reputation is built on white.

The wines are not cheap and sell largely through allocation. But they are the most honest available version of what this appellation actually is, as distinct from what its name has come to mean.