On Thu, 8 Jan 2004 00:29:56 +0100, Emery Davis >
wrote:

>A curious bottle.
>
>A very champagne like nose, all grilled toast and green apple. I can't ever
>recall a still wine with a nose so redolent of champagne.
>
>Extremely complex in the mouth, still with the champagne-like quality of
>green apple and toast, but also licorice, rose water, lavender honey,
>melon, cake and thyme [!]. A nice bit of chewyness. I found it a bit
>loose at the end, but the flavor of it certainly stuck around in the mouth.
>(I was the only one who considered calling it "short").
>
>I am uncertain as to what the encepagement would be. Don't recall
>seeing the etiquette "blanc de blancs" in CdP before. I certainly would
>have thought Clairette + ?. Viognier is not authorized in CdP Blanc, is it?

First, the grapes. Grenache blanc would be main variety, a quite
aromatic white grape that I am getting to like more and more, the new
generation of winemakers is getting splendid results out of this
grape, and C9dP in particular, my personal favourite is Domaine de la
Janasse. I can understand you thinking Viognier, your nose correctly
detected an aromatic grape variety, but I think there would be none in
C9dP.

About the "blanc de blancs" labelling, it gets me quite riled up,
because 99.99 % of still wines are blanc de blancs, and labelling it
so is just a marketing ploy to make the average consumer think he is
getting something different than other whites. When I see this, I
immediately become suspicious. Here in Bandol, Domaine Ott does the
same thing, and what is Ott's wine? Overpriced not very interesting
wine with goood marketing. I am surprised to find Font de Michelle
resorting to this, because they seem te be making good wine, and with
the attention enjoyed by C9dP recently, they don't need any more
marketing.

Mike