Mathieu Cosme Vouvray Les Promenards 2020

Domaine de Beaumont is located just outside of Noizay, a village fronting the Loire in the far southeastern corner of Vouvray. Founded in 1930, it is currently headed by the fifth generation of the Cosme family, Mathieu. After a degree in enology and an étage of Domaine Huet, Mathieu has made a name for himself by making powerful, dry, and precise cuvées of Chenin Blanc from 13 hectares of vineyards with ideal southern and southeastern exposure – wines that suit a former rugby player who is more comfortable behind a horse-drawn plow than behind a desk – or a dinner table rather than a tasting table for that matter. It is a cliché to view a vigneron’s wines as a reflection of their physicality and personality, but this is the indelible human element to terroir. At Domaine de Beaumont under Mathieu Cosme, this is doubly so. At first blush, the wines are not only substantial and impressively nuanced renditions of terroir, but they also develop in the glass (and in the bottle!), revealing a sensitivity and a nurturing aspect reflective of his work both in the cellar and among the vines. If blessed, each generation in an appellation can boast only a handful of rising stars – and Mathieu Cosme is certainly among them in Vouvray. Each cuvée at Domaine de Beaumont is a precise reflection of its terroir and originates from parcels situated on the premier côte and deuxième côte close to, and immediately above the Loire. These slopes have the thinnest soils over tuffeau bedrock, which, when combined with their orientation, prove to be the best sites for making dry Vouvray. Les Promenards is a site further inland on rolling hills and part of the deuxième côte where there are slightly deeper clay soils over tuffeau. Here, Mathieu crafts a dry Vouvray from 50-year-old vines that his grandfather planted. Closer to the river and on the premier côte is Les Enfers, a name that reflects this vineyard’s warmth and where 40-year-old vines are planted on flint gravel and shallow clay soils underpinned with tuffeau. The Domaine has been certified organic since the 2014 vintage, and Mathieu has plowed the soils by horse since 2005 when he finished his étage at Huet and returned to run his family’s estate. Harvest is manual, and fermentations are indigenous. The wines are fermented and aged in 400L French oak barrels, as has been the tradition in Vouvray for centuries. We’ve searched for an estate in Vouvray making chiseled and forthright dry wines and made with minimal intervention for years. With Mathieu Cosme, we not only got that, but the rising star of Vouvray.