{"id":124,"date":"2013-05-13T09:13:25","date_gmt":"2013-05-13T09:13:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/belletwine.com\/?p=124"},"modified":"2013-05-13T09:13:25","modified_gmt":"2013-05-13T09:13:25","slug":"2013-annual-vintage-tasting","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/belletwine.com\/?p=124","title":{"rendered":"2013 Annual Bellet Vintage Tasting"},"content":{"rendered":"

The launch of the 2012 White and Ros\u00e9 vintage and older Reds<\/h3>\n
\"The<\/a>
Tasting Collet Bovis at Domaine de Toasc<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Every spring, in April or May, the Bellet appellation hosts its new vintage tasting. The tasting is important for the vineyards keen to show the wines currently available to the region’s sommeliers and wine shop owners as well as journalists. This year’s was held at Domaine de Toasc<\/em>.<\/p>\n

Luckily, in a spring marked by cool, wet days, the weather remained perfect – bright blue skies, sunny but not too hot.<\/p>\n

I am a big fan of the wines of Bellet. I think the wines keep on getting better and better and should be well supported by locals. With only 60ha under vine, the wines of Bellet are a small but important part of the gastronomy of the C\u00f4te d’Azur.\u00a0<\/p>\n

White<\/h3>\n

The white wines of Bellet are almost all made from 100% Rolle. The wines differ due to clonal selection, terroir and vinification. Two styles are followed: unoaked and oaked.<\/p>\n

As usual, the white 2012 of\u00a0Domaine St Jean<\/em>\u00a0showed the most aromatic fruit character with lots of zesty citrus fruit character and ripe fruit.\u00a0Ch\u00e2teau\u00a0de Cr\u00e9mat<\/em>‘s\u00a0white 2010 showed more minerality on the nose, with long citrus-zest acidity balanced by good weight and long length.\u00a0Toasc<\/em>‘s\u00a0white 2012 had more floral aromatics giving the wine great charm, while the ripeness of fruit dominates the structural acidity.\u00a0Domaine de la Source<\/em>‘s\u00a0two whites from 2012 showed the difference through age of vines. The younger vines produced wines with good acidity, round rich fruit with hints of almonds and weight from ageing sur lees. Their Cuv\u00e9e L’Echapp\u00e9e Belle, made the same way but from 30-year old vines, had far greater weight, intensity and and very good acidity. Domaine Vinceline<\/em>\u00a0and\u00a0Via Julia-Augusta<\/em>\u00a0whites were both very closed, possibly due to recent bottling.<\/p>\n

Of the oak-influenced wines, big, Burgundian style wines were favoured. As they had spent time in oak, these were a year older, not suffering from youth and recent bottling.\u00a0Ch\u00e2teau de Bellet<\/em>‘s\u00a0White 2011 Cuv\u00e9e Baron G. (95% Rolle 5% Chardonnay), aged in oak, soft and round, was already showing signs of peaking with soft toffee characters coming to the fore.\u00a0Clos Nicea<\/em>‘s\u00a02011, aged in 1-year and 3-year old oak had dominating oak aromas and was drying out on palate. Good acidity and up-front freshness helped but overall lacking length and charm.\u00a0Collet de Bovis<\/em>‘s\u00a02011 en barrique also had dominating oak but its Cuv\u00e9e Prestige 2011, with 11 months in barrique with MLF and battonage was successful with creamy smooth fruit, good acidity and was well balanced. The most successful for me was the\u00a0Clos St Vincent<\/em>\u00a02011 which was both fermented and aged in barrique, giving gentle but not dominating oak character and good weight with a nutty leesy character.<\/p>\n

Ros\u00e9<\/h3>\n

The ros\u00e9 wines are largely made from Braquet and are very different from the pale ros\u00e9s of Provence, favouring more fruit and charm than the often too neutral styles of the rest of the region. All the ros\u00e9s were from the 2012 vintage.\u00a0Ch\u00e2teau de Bellet<\/em>\u00a0Baron G and\u00a0Cr\u00e9mat<\/em>\u00a0both showed very creamy, red fruit, good acidity.\u00a0Toasc<\/em>, Collet de Bovis<\/em>\u00a0and\u00a0la Source<\/em>\u00a0were less creamy but had crisp ripe red fruit and fresh acidity. La Source<\/em> in particular had amazingly long mouth-watering acidity.\u00a0St Vincent<\/em>\u00a0had an extra edge of complexity with hints of bitter orange acidity behind the ripe red fruit.\u00a0Ch\u00e2teau de Bellet<\/em>\u00a0and Via Julia-Augusta<\/em>\u00a0were both too closed from recent bottling to be fully appreciated.<\/p>\n

Red<\/h3>\n

Bellet red wines are largely made up of Folle Noire, with a few having added Grenache and Bracquet. Three vintages were present: 2011, 2010 and 2009.<\/p>\n

The 2011’s were a mixed bag, ranging from\u00a0Cr\u00e9mat<\/em>‘s\u00a0big black fruit with fresh acidity and muscular tannins, through\u00a0Clos Nicea<\/em>‘s\u00a0fresh red fruit with floral aromas and\u00a0Via Julia-Augusta<\/em>‘s\u00a0fresh raspberry and mouthwatering fresh acidity – the latters delicacy reflecting the higher percentage of Braquet in the blend of grapes.\u00a0Ch\u00e2teau de Bellet<\/em>‘s Baron G\u00a0and\u00a0Domaine Vinceline<\/em>\u00a0were both very closed, showing little fruit and lots of tannins.<\/p>\n

The 2010’s were more unified in style with\u00a0Clos St Vincent<\/em>,\u00a0Collet de Bovis<\/em>,\u00a0Toasc<\/em>\u00a0and\u00a0Via Julia-Augusta<\/em>‘s\u00a0Cuv\u00e9e Sp\u00e9ciale all showing big black juicy fruit, with good chewy tannins and fresh acidity.<\/p>\n

The two 2009’s from\u00a0la Source<\/em>\u00a0and\u00a0Toasc<\/em>\u00a0were both full of red, raspberry fruit, with hints of fresh green leaves on the nose of the La Source<\/em> wine. Both showed slightly more mature tannins and very fresh acidity.<\/p>\n

\"View<\/a>
View over the vineyards of Domaine de Toasc looking west over the Var towards the Baou de St Jeannet<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The launch of the 2012 White and Ros\u00e9 vintage and older Reds Every spring, in April or May, the Bellet appellation hosts its new vintage tasting. The tasting is important for the vineyards keen to show the wines currently available to the region’s sommeliers and wine shop owners as well as journalists. This year’s was […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[20,28],"class_list":["post-124","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-new-vintage","tag-vintage-tasting"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/belletwine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/124","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/belletwine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/belletwine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/belletwine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/belletwine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=124"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/belletwine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/124\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/belletwine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=124"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/belletwine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=124"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/belletwine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=124"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}