Domaine de la Fontainerie
Catherine Dhoye-Deruet took over the family estate in 1990 from her father. The family has been growing Chenin Blanc wine in the area of Vouvray since 1712. With five hectares in production and one more to be planted, the grapes are harvested manually and crops are limited to about 35-40 hectoliters per hectare. Her cellars are carved into the limestone cliffs in the Vallée Coquette, and in fact her prize vineyard Le Coteau de la Fontainerie grows in the soil above the cellar.
The vineyard management here is minimalist, in that the pruning is extremely short, and the treatments only when absolutely necessary. The goal here is to create wines which express the remarkable relationship that the chenin blanc has with the terroir of Vouvray. This can only be achieved with small concentrated crops of healthy fruit. Catherine is one of the producers leading the way back towards the production of true dry Vouvray. These were becoming lost as the market moved to more mass produced, demi-sec wines made from chaptalised grape must. The demi-sec and moëlleux wines are only produced in exceptional vintages and are never chaptalised. | 