Sylvain Dittière (La Porte Saint Jean), 2017 Saumur Rouge 'Les Pouches'
Cab Franc du Jour #83
The names Sylvain Dittière and La Porte Saint Jean may not be immediately familiar to everyone, but if there is one name from the new generation of vignerons in Saumur that deserves your attention, it is Sylvain Dittière.
A Loire Valley native, Sylvain’s family cultivated roses locally, and at the age of 16 he fell in love with the woman who would eventually become his partner, Pauline Foucault, daughter of Charly and Françoise Foucault of Clos Rougeard and Château Yvonne respectively. His journey in wine began not long after, when he started working at Château Yvonne in Saumur-Champigny in 1999, then under the guidance of Françoise Foucault. In addition to completing his formal winemaking studies and being intimately connected to the world of Clos Rougeard, Sylvain also spent time with Pauline’s brother Antoine Foucault of Domaine du Collier, Thierry Germain of Domaine des Roches Neuves, Gérard Gauby in the Roussillon, and Marc Tempé in Alsace.
Sylvain established La Porte Saint Jean in the commune of Montreuil-Bellay in 2010. He farms 6 hectares in Saumur, with approximately 4 hectares of Cabernet Franc and 2 hectares devoted to Chenin Blanc and Sauvignon Blanc. Today’s wine, Les Pouches, is one of two Saumur Rouge he produces, alongside Les Cormiers from the commune of Doué-en-Fontaine.
The Montreuil-Bellay Commune
The Saumur AOP covers 31 communes across three departments in the Loire and encompasses five appellations: Saumur Rouge, Saumur Blanc, Saumur Rosé, Saumur Puy-Notre-Dame, and Saumur Mousseux. It also covers the nine communes of the Saumur-Champigny AOP for sparkling wines, whites, and rosés. Across this large appellation the terroir diversity is considerable, but for today’s wine the focus is specifically on the commune of Montreuil-Bellay.
Montreuil-Bellay sits about 15km south of the village of Saumur. What makes it geologically distinctive is the Montreuil-Bellay fault, which stretches roughly 150km and has, through tectonic activity over hundreds of millions of years, exposed a different bedrock and soil profile across several communes in the region. Across four communes specifically, Doué-en-Fontaine, Brossay, Vaudelnay, and Montreuil-Bellay, a narrow band of Jurassic-era limestones and soils is exposed. As with the Turonian tuffeau chalks of Saumur-Champigny, Chinon, and Bourgueil, there is considerable complexity within these Jurassic-era soils.
Within Montreuil-Bellay itself, the main viticultural area flanks both sides of the Thouet River, a Loire tributary originating near the village of Saumur. The diversity of soils here from lieu-dit to lieu-dit and parcel to parcel is remarkable: ancient alluvium from the Thouet, Jurassic-era limestones and marls, the flinty Jurassic-era limestone more common in the neighbouring commune of Brossay, and even some Cenomanian-era limestones, sands, and clays in places.
Les Pouches
The lieu-dit of Les Pouches sits in the heart of the Montreuil-Bellay commune, on the east side of the Thouet River, on a very gentle west-northwest-facing slope in what is essentially an ancient riverbed. Sylvain holds 2 hectares of Cabernet Franc here, acquired in 2017. Half the vines are around 20 years of age and half are approximately 70 years old. The soils in his parcels are predominantly deep ancient alluvium, a clayey-sandy silt with around 50% silt content, sitting atop a bedrock of Jurassic-era yellow marl. The parcels have been farmed organically from the beginning.
In the Cellar
The approach is traditional throughout. The fruit is hand-picked and sorted meticulously, once in the vineyard and twice in the cellar, before being destemmed. Fermentation takes place in a combination of large closed conical wooden tanks and concrete tanks, with maceration entirely by infusion. The tanks are filled to the brim with berries and sealed, and the condensation that forms on the inside of the tank lid during fermentation naturally keeps the cap moist without any active intervention. Total skin contact runs approximately four weeks. Aging takes place in one to three year old oak barrels of 225 and 228L for around two years, in underground cellars dating to the 13th century.
Wine Details
Producer: La Porte Saint Jean (Sylvain Dittière)
Appellation: Saumur Rouge
Commune: Montreuil-Bellay
Lieux-Dits: Les Pouches
Soils: Deep clayey-sandy silt (ancient alluvium) topsoil, atop a Jurassic-era yellow marl bedrock
Alcohol: 12.5%