Toques et Clochers, Limoux

Sommelier’s Diaries

Toques et Clochers, Limoux
by Ronan Sayburn MS

Our Head of Wine, Ronan Sayburn MS, is bringing us on his trips to find the best wines for 67 Pall Mall Members. He shares with us his stories and recommendations.

Limoux, Languedoc, South of France

“Grant and I recently attended Toques et Clochers, an annual two-day festival and barrel auction in the Languedoc area of Southern France. The event is dedicated to the celebration of Chardonnay produced specifically in Limoux, an area of ancient marine limestones, located 20km from the historic walled city of Carcassonne.

The Limoux AOC comprises 7,800ha of vines, and along with Burgundy and the Jura produces an outstanding expression of this grape variety. Similarly to Burgundy the vineyards were planted initially by a Benedictine order of monks from the Abbey of Saint-Hilaire. We were keen to purchase a barrel (300 bottles) of this lean and minerally wine for the 67 Pall Mall wine list.

The Toques et Clochers festival

Toques et Clochers has taken place each year since 1991 and is sponsored by the Sieur d’Arques wine co-operative. Each year a different village in the appellation is chosen to host the festival and the money raised is used to restore the church and bell towers in that village.

The festival ends with a gala banquet hosted by 3 Michelin starred French chefs – this year being René and Maxime Meilleur of the Savoie. The event’s name refers to the tall hats worn by chefs (toques) and bell towers (clochers).

A region with 4 climates

Drawing on historical climate data, the vineyards are divided into four ‘terroirs’, ranked in order of harvesting:

The Terroir Méditerranéen: hot climate is tempered by sea breezes that create ambient humidity, promoting a rapid increase in sugar levels and producing wines with depth and texture but underlying salty minerality;
The Terroir d’Autun: surrounding the town of Limoux and sheltered from rainflow by two mountain ranges – the Corbières and the Chalabrais – this area enjoys a relatively hot, dry climate and producing aromatic richer wines;
The Terroir Océanique: characterised by a temperate, humid climate, exposed to westerly airflows. Ripening is approximately two weeks later here than in the two previous Terroirs and produces wines with a saline, fresh minerality;
The Terroir de la Haute-Vallée: set in the upper reaches of the river Aude, towards the Pyrenees, this damper, colder area due to late spring and cool autumn also has a higher elevation (300m) and produces full wines with balanced acidity.

And the Tasting!

The first day was spent tasting barrel samples from all 53 villages where we could asses the quality and styles that we wanted and earmark our favourites before the auction. There were four wines that we particularly liked and on the second day we attended the auction where we bought two barrels.

One from Jean-Marie Alins in Malras from terroir Océanique and one from Jean-Luc Serie in Villebazy from terroir Méditerranéen. Both wines show a freshness and saline minerality with balanced gentle oak flavours, a style somewhere between Chablis and Puligny-Montrachet. Each barrel cost just over €6,000. The wines will be bottled in December and find its way onto our list before Christmas.

The event finished with a gala dinner for around six hundred international guests, sommeliers and winemakers.

NB. Limoux is also famous for its sparkling wine production – they claim to have put the bubbles in wine before Champagne, making an excellent Cremant from Chardonnay and also Blanquette (aka. Mauzac) de Limoux.