The Hautes Cances Cairanne label For me, Cairanne is the finest, most complex and most flavorful of the Cotes du Rhone Village wines. In fact Cairanne is on the brink of being awarded its own AOC like Gigondas. This is a major step and recognition that indeed Cairanne is consistently superior in quality to the other designated Villages which themselves are at the top of the quality pyramid in the Cotes du Rhone. These named Villages represent only 7% of the Rhone's wine production.
Cairanne's prices will start to rise. Now is the time to stock up before this quality recognition is priced into the wine.
Get your stew pot bubbling or your lamb on the grill and your corkscrew twisting. This Hautes Cances Cotes du Rhone Villages-Cairanne will make you want seconds of everything! This wine is powerful, knee-deep in black fruits and so beautifully balanced.
The Astart family's holdings are small and they harvest each plot with care.
If you know this wine from previous vintages I know you will want some of this ready-to-enjoy 2011. It is soft, round, smooth and incredibly concentrated. For me, it has the taste of Provence. Fresh dark red fruit mixed with the unique Rhone garrigues, the local scrub and herbs of rosemary and thyme, and of course the mineral taste of stones found in all the best Rhone vineyards. This is Provence at its best - and still priced as an everyday wine while delivering so much more.
The vineyard is small and a very gravely special hillside plot. The soil is that magic hillside clay-limestone that drains from the top and yet harbors water deep in the earth to nourish the vines during times of drought, which are frequent in the southern Rhone.
These wines are not fined or filtered. The wine is aged for 12 months in Burgundian oak, not new. The cepage is nearly half Grenache accompanied by Syrah, Mourvedre, Carignan, and Cinsault.
There is severe selection in the vineyard so only the ripest and most comely grapes make it to the vat. Jean-Marie uses a modest amount of older Gigondas barrels for aging this wine. He does not fine or filter. When you have your first sips of this wine, swirl it around in your mouth and think about its richness and its length.
I don't think I know any grower who puts more effort into their wines than this familial pair from the southern Rhone. They pretty much work themselves to the bone, but the wines are fabulous! And, the prices are so amazingly reasonable.
Jean-Marie and Anne-Marie work out of a modest house in the middle of the village of Cairanne. Anne-Marie's great grandparents created Domaine les Hautes Cances in 1890. The land passed down through the family until it came to Anne-Marie. When she inherited the property she was already ensconced in a medical career as was her husband, Jean-Marie.
Jean-Marie built a new winemaking facility into the hillside for natural temperature control. His vinification is done using gravity to protect the grapes along their journey into the vat. The place is absolutely eat-off-the-floor pristine.
To say that you will enjoy this wine would be an understatement. This is a wine you will remember to purchase again.
-Margot Hurley
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