Perfect Autumnal arrivals from Béa & Etienne of Clos Kixhaya.
Committed to working simply with what they have, Béa & Etienne have proved very resourceful in capturing a dazzling array of expressions from their single variety: four hectares of old Cab Franc vines on sandy gravel over clay and limestone beside the river in Chinon. Working organically with some biodynamic treatments, in recent years, Béa has also stopped working the soil, and has now developed a whole library of local plant infusions to treat the vines.
Each cuvée's final style is dictated by the picking date: early for the Pet Nat and Blanc De Noir, in the middle for Grappes Me and Les Grappes, and the oldest vines picked last for wines like Le Clos and Amphores. Work in the cellar is careful and considered, working with concrete, old barrels and amphora for ageing, with no additions added at any stage.
The new wines arrive from across a handful of vintages.
A really balanced climate in 2023 has produced an alive, juicy Pet Nat, a Blanc De Noirs with beautiful tension and layers of complexity, and a very gluggable Grappes Me. The wines are showing great depth of fruit. 2021 was a much cooler, wet vintage, so the reds have tremendous freshness and aromatics, with structure that has integrated really beautifully as they have aged. Alongside the new arrivals, we have also released our remaining bottles of their biggest release from their debut vintage - Les Amphores 2020 - macerated in amphora for 9 months and aged in the same vessels for the same time, it has developed into an astonishing wine when given the time to open.
The wines are detailed in full below:
2023 - Pet by Nat - Cab Franc
Very happy to have their Pet Nat back - these are second grapes to be selected, picked a week after their Blanc de Noir, as the grapes just reach maturity. Hand harvested, with fruit basket-pressed over 4 hours. Ferments in stainless steel until residual sugar drops to 20g, bottled and allowed to continue fermentation slowly. Rests on the lees until disgorging, no additions. Bright, juicy and long. Pet Nat Deluxe.
2023 - Blanc de Noirs - Cab Franc
We've been eagerly awaiting the arrival of this one since our first taste of Bea's 2020 Blanc De Noir nearly five years ago. Intervening vintages have proved difficult to replicate the lightning bolt of the 2020, so we see the 2023 released next whilst the '22 continues to rest. Beautiful tension, layered and complex, its a wine we adore. Picked earliest, basket pressed over 4 hours. Fermented and aged for 6 months in old oak barrel. Bottled unfined and unfiltered, with no additions.
2023 - GrappesMe - Cab Franc
A giddy-fruited, instantly crushable whole-bunch Cab Franc winner.Hand harvested from 25-30 year old vines. A 5 day maceration of whole bunches in concrete, spontaneous fermentation. Basket pressed back to concrete for 8 months. No additions.
2021 - Les Grappes - Cab Franc
Béa likes to call Les Grappes 'the thermometer of the vintage' deciding in 2021 - and continuing since - to follow the same process each year so the vintage variation shines through. Lots of rain in 21, the wine is nervy and energetic, heady with crushed violets, lovely tension. Whole-bunch maceration in tank for 10 days, no pigeage, just wetting the cap with juice occasionally. Free-run juice emptied to tank every two days, hoping to keep extraction of the green stems as low as possible. Basket-pressed slowly over 24 hours, and aged in concrete for 7 months before bottling with no additions.
20/21 - Transcendance - Cab Franc
A wine dedicated to - and with a label illustrated by - Béa's brother, a trans man who works to support the transgender community. In Béa's words: "We're all made from the same flesh, and I wanted to illustrate this by making a wine bringing together two different methods: at the end of the day, it doesn't matter if it's de-stemmed and in wood or whole bunch in steel: it's all wine!" A portion of the proceeds from the wine will go to a charity supporting the transgender community. 2020 fruit is from old vines macerated for one month, aged 18 months in barrel, 2021 fruit is younger vines, a two-week whole bunch maceration and aged in tank 6 months before the two were assembled.
2021 - Le Clos - Cab Franc
From their first vintage and their oldest vines- up to 90 years old - Le Clos is a deep & vibrant expression of Cab Franc, dark fruited with a saline, mineral core. Picked and de-stemmed by hand, macerated for 40 days with zero extraction in stainless steel, with a little juice poured over to keep the cap wet. Basket pressed incredibly gently over 24 hours to old barrels, aged for a year before bottling.
2020 - Les Amphores - Cab Franc
From a portion of their oldest vines, up to 90 years old. Picked and de-stemmed by hand, macerated for 9 months in tank, with no extraction. Basket pressed over 24 hours to three Amphora for a further 9 months. Assembled and bottled with no additions. It's deep and intriguing, wiring itself around a mineral core, it has been developing beautifully over the years; we still can't quite believe how accomplished this debut vintage was - one ready for this winter's crowded tables.
