Wine tasting at Chateau Peroudier, Monbazillac

Sometimes, when you’re free-wheeling down a big hill away from a big chateau, you just have to strain the brakes of your unfamiliar bike and stop at a winery, just because you’re passing. And because you see a sign that tells you they have ‘degustations’ (tastings). We did just that with Chateau Peroudier in Monbazillac because it was just so cute and clearly most of the oenotourism was passing them by.

We entered a light, homely tasting room and we greeted by utter, utter silence. We looked for a bell, or some other way of attracting attention and eventually were shouted at by a wizened and elderly French woman who wanted to know what we wanted and wasn’t afraid to look grumpy about it. Fair enough, she’s probably been making wine all her life, it’s hard work.

I used my best crap French to explain who we were and what we wanted. As the wine notebook came out, she softened up considerably and by the end of the tasting we were firm friends. In a very fleeting way, but I shall always remember her fondly nonetheless. We tasted two of their wines, and after a day in Monbazilliac, which has great variety, but still a degree of general homogeneity about its sweet wines, we were blown away by the lovely vintages they were producing. Definitely the most stand out unique wine in the appellation. Which is admittedly probably a bad thing to the French, but reeked of terroir and expertise to us.

Chateau Peroudier 
Monbazillac 2012
Bottled at the chateau, this is a really light Monbazillac sweet wine which has almost a chlorine smell on the nose, but in a rather appealing, light touch way. It was not overpoweringly or cloyingly sweet, but light honey mixed with a hint of lemon, delicate floral notes and perhaps a sprinkling of fig. Delicious, rounded and very more-ish. A great, complex but still accessible way into the punchy flavours caused by the ‘noble rot’.

Chateau Peroudier
Bergerac sec 2012
A really interesting wine. Harvested early in the season from their 50 hectares (not sure if that was the whole vineyard or just the sauvignon blanc. Sorry, must try harder with my French. Just checked the website, 50 hectares is the total vineyard, so a medium size for the area from what I heard). This wine also had a very delicate colour, with a fragrance of apple blossom, it was rounded and smooth in the mouth and again had the sort of lemony, but without the acid, hit that we have now come to associate with this winery. Delicious, and by far the finest Bergerac sec we had during our trip to Aquitaine.

Sorry, thought taking photos of the wine would be a bit beyond the pale for our generous and convivial host…