Domaine Jean-Baptiste Senat Minervois Le Bois des Merveilles, Languedoc-Roussillon, France

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A blend of Grenache with smaller amounts of Carignan and Mourvedre, all aged in mature demi-muids, Senat's 2009 Minervois Le Bois des Merveilles offers scents and flavors of lightly-cooked black raspberry, dark chocolate, licorice, and humus. Boasting the same powdery tannins and seductively soothing aura as the corresponding La Nine but in more concentrated form, this adds a bright stream of primary juiciness and a saliva-inducing salinity to its delectable finish. It should be a delight to follow for at least the next 6-8 years. Incidentally, weighing-in at around 14.5% alcohol places this as high as any finished Senat bottlings have been known to climb. (As noted in my introduction to this report on Senat, the raw materials that will inform his 2010 Bois des Merveilles - a wine expected to reach our shores - promise plenty of excitement.) Jean-Baptiste Senat's 15 immaculately-tended, geologically-complex, wind-exposed hectares around Trausse in western Minervois are devoted entirely to black grapes - predominantly head-pruned Grenache, Carignan, and Mourvedre, along with a bit of Syrah near the boundary of the appellation. Even the Mourvedre vines here are three decades old, this having been one of the sectors of Minervois penetrated by a surprisingly early awareness of that grape's potential. "West of the village it's too cool for it to ripen," notes Senat, "and anyway in the garrigue it's too dry. On the plain the soil is too rich and you get Mourvedre with huge bunches. The sole place where it succeeds is in one sticky clay-rich sector near the village. The big problem in the Languedoc is that the different cepages get planted and treated analogously with famous growing regions, so you have people trying to make Bandol from their Mourvedre; Grenache as it if were Chateauneuf; and Hermitage out of Syrah, which I believe is daft. But unfortunately, we lack an historical reference point. Our ancestors cannot tell us how to approach the task of rendering great Languedoc wines." Whatever is lacking, the passionately quality-conscious and candidly self-critical Senat seems well on his way to remedying by means of imagination, experimentation, and hard work. "I'm interested in capturing more than the sucrosity of fruit," he explains. "I also look for a positive vegetal dimension, for bitter elements, and for digestabilite and freshness, (to) capture nuance and achieve an arbitrage between ripeness and freshness." It would be hard to more succinctly characterize the profoundly and distinctively delicious results he is achieving. Senat opined that the dry, hot 2001 and 2003 vintages served as excellent training for how to achieve these ideals in 2009. But there is no question that 2008 and 2010 are better-suited to his aesthetic ideals, and in addition to the wines on which I was able to offer notes below, the as yet unassembled lots that will for the most part inform his 2010 Le Bois des Merveilles cuvee were riveting and mouthwatering. By the way, Senat likes his wines to kick into malo-lactic transformation on the heels - or even before the completion - of alcoholic fermentation. They appear to need little encouragement in that regard, and it's hard to argue with the results. Besides having a chance to visit his vineyards and absorb considerable lore in the process, I was able to taste wines going back to Senat's 1996 arrival at Trausse (where his ancestors were not vignerons) after having grown up and trained academically in Paris but then gotten the urge to "work with his hands."Importer: Weygandt-Metzler, Unionville, PA; tel. (610) 486-0800

Senat's 2008 Minervois Le Bois des Merveilles is dominated by Carignan, with the support of Grenache and a mere smidgeon of Mourvedre (which struggled to ripen in this vintage). Sweet, musky perfume suggestive of narcissus or peony, when combined with animal and marine mineral scents puts me in mind of the uncanny allure of a great red Burgundy. The rich yet very fresh concentration of blackberry and black raspberry here is tinged with salt, iodine, and smoke in a manner that evokes concentrated shrimp shell reduction, rich meat stock, and whisky-like peatiness. This exhibits a level of savor - or, if you wish, umami - that I would be happy to find distributed over two wines! Bittersweet licorice, chard, and walnut oil add bass clef notes to a deeply- yet dynamically-layered performance, much of which - for all of the bright juiciness it also conveys - takes place below the bar line. The tannins are powdery and the finish here at once soothing and invigorating, not to mention hauntingly complex and persistent. I would anticipate this rewarding continued attention for the better part of a decade. Jean-Baptiste Senat's 15 immaculately-tended, geologically-complex, wind-exposed hectares around Trausse in western Minervois are devoted entirely to black grapes - predominantly head-pruned Grenache, Carignan, and Mourvedre, along with a bit of Syrah near the boundary of the appellation. Even the Mourvedre vines here are three decades old, this having been one of the sectors of Minervois penetrated by a surprisingly early awareness of that grape's potential. "West of the village it's too cool for it to ripen," notes Senat, "and anyway in the garrigue it's too dry. On the plain the soil is too rich and you get Mourvedre with huge bunches. The sole place where it succeeds is in one sticky clay-rich sector near the village. The big problem in the Languedoc is that the different cepages get planted and treated analogously with famous growing regions, so you have people trying to make Bandol from their Mourvedre; Grenache as it if were Chateauneuf; and Hermitage out of Syrah, which I believe is daft. But unfortunately, we lack an historical reference point. Our ancestors cannot tell us how to approach the task of rendering great Languedoc wines." Whatever is lacking, the passionately quality-conscious and candidly self-critical Senat seems well on his way to remedying by means of imagination, experimentation, and hard work. "I'm interested in capturing more than the sucrosity of fruit," he explains. "I also look for a positive vegetal dimension, for bitter elements, and for digestabilite and freshness, (to) capture nuance and achieve an arbitrage between ripeness and freshness." It would be hard to more succinctly characterize the profoundly and distinctively delicious results he is achieving. Senat opined that the dry, hot 2001 and 2003 vintages served as excellent training for how to achieve these ideals in 2009. But there is no question that 2008 and 2010 are better-suited to his aesthetic ideals, and in addition to the wines on which I was able to offer notes below, the as yet unassembled lots that will for the most part inform his 2010 Le Bois des Merveilles cuvee were riveting and mouthwatering. By the way, Senat likes his wines to kick into malo-lactic transformation on the heels - or even before the completion - of alcoholic fermentation. They appear to need little encouragement in that regard, and it's hard to argue with the results. Besides having a chance to visit his vineyards and absorb considerable lore in the process, I was able to taste wines going back to Senat's 1996 arrival at Trausse (where his ancestors were not vignerons) after having grown up and trained academically in Paris but then gotten the urge to "work with his hands."Importer: Weygandt-Metzler, Unionville, PA; tel. (610) 486-0800

The Senat 2007 Minervois Le Bois des Merveilles reflects a successful vintage for Mourvedre, even though Grenache and Carignan still dominate numerically. Bloody, salted beef juices as well as walnut and pistachio oil seem to mingle with the dominant ripe mulberry and black raspberry fruit. This displays in spades the polish and refinement of tannin that are Senat hallmarks and manages to project advanced ripeness and expansive richness - even a certain liqueur-like allure - yet without any superficial sweetness or sense of heaviness. It should beguile for at least another half dozen years. (A still-fascinating inaugural Senat bottling from vintage 1996 - all Grenache - remains fascinating although it is becoming fatigued. But Senat's stylistic vision and technique - not to mention his raw materials - have to say the least evolved since then.)Jean-Baptiste Senat's 15 immaculately-tended, geologically-complex, wind-exposed hectares around Trausse in western Minervois are devoted entirely to black grapes - predominantly head-pruned Grenache, Carignan, and Mourvedre, along with a bit of Syrah near the boundary of the appellation. Even the Mourvedre vines here are three decades old, this having been one of the sectors of Minervois penetrated by a surprisingly early awareness of that grape's potential. "West of the village it's too cool for it to ripen," notes Senat, "and anyway in the garrigue it's too dry. On the plain the soil is too rich and you get Mourvedre with huge bunches. The sole place where it succeeds is in one sticky clay-rich sector near the village. The big problem in the Languedoc is that the different cepages get planted and treated analogously with famous growing regions, so you have people trying to make Bandol from their Mourvedre; Grenache as it if were Chateauneuf; and Hermitage out of Syrah, which I believe is daft. But unfortunately, we lack an historical reference point. Our ancestors cannot tell us how to approach the task of rendering great Languedoc wines." Whatever is lacking, the passionately quality-conscious and candidly self-critical Senat seems well on his way to remedying by means of imagination, experimentation, and hard work. "I'm interested in capturing more than the sucrosity of fruit," he explains. "I also look for a positive vegetal dimension, for bitter elements, and for digestabilite and freshness, (to) capture nuance and achieve an arbitrage between ripeness and freshness." It would be hard to more succinctly characterize the profoundly and distinctively delicious results he is achieving. Senat opined that the dry, hot 2001 and 2003 vintages served as excellent training for how to achieve these ideals in 2009. But there is no question that 2008 and 2010 are better-suited to his aesthetic ideals, and in addition to the wines on which I was able to offer notes below, the as yet unassembled lots that will for the most part inform his 2010 Le Bois des Merveilles cuvee were riveting and mouthwatering. By the way, Senat likes his wines to kick into malo-lactic transformation on the heels - or even before the completion - of alcoholic fermentation. They appear to need little encouragement in that regard, and it's hard to argue with the results. Besides having a chance to visit his vineyards and absorb considerable lore in the process, I was able to taste wines going back to Senat's 1996 arrival at Trausse (where his ancestors were not vignerons) after having grown up and trained academically in Paris but then gotten the urge to "work with his hands."Importer: Weygandt-Metzler, Unionville, PA; tel. (610) 486-0800