100% Cabernet Franc, Loire Valley, FR
For the first time in Ontario, welcome Les Landes! From fifty year old Cabernet Franc vines grown on dense flint & red clay soils comes this sultry & rustic red, charmingly old-fashioned like a well-executed 50’s greaser-inspired fit on an extremely sexy vintage clothing enthusiast. Cabernet Franc is so incredibly versatile that sometimes you can’t help but feel like it’s having something of an identity crisis, in this case it drinks like Cab Franc-does-Cab Sauv, firm yet juicy, weighty medium body veering into full, rugged tannic structure from eighteen months of aging in oak & all the resultant flavour characteristics that come with the territory: cigar box! Vintage leather chair! Flowering tobacco leaf, cedar chest, woodshop, crystal tumbler, giant old-fashioned library kitted out in those Beauty and the Beast-style sliding ladders, books bound exclusively in leather & cloth. Even at its heaviest, Cab Franc is always more of a red fruit kinda guy, in this case we’ve got macerated cherry and rich, decadent plum butter. The texture is incredibly buttery on the palate, which is rare for a red, but now that we’ve experienced it we’d like to see it more often! Rustic chic, sprinkle of paprika, dense & complex, like having a torrid affair with an extremely hot farmer (and/or sexy vintage clothing enthusiast).