Château Mont-Redon Châteauneuf-du-Pape 2017

Why is this Wine so Yummy?

Review of the 2016

About Mont-Redon

Up until the adoption of the Appellation Contrôlée system in the 1930’s Mont Redon, along with the likes of Château Rayas, was one of the few “Grand Crus” in Châteauneuf du Pape. Their appellation bottlings are in fact single vineyard wines, made from the commanding plateau (the highest in the appellation at 360ft) to the north-west of the Village, recognised as one of the finest sites in the entire appellation. Vines have a history on this site dating back to 1334, but only 2 hectares remained in 1923, when the current establishment took over. Since then the vineyards have been developed and nurtured with precision, making use of the diverse range of soils on the 163ha estate dominated by the pudding stone galets of the plateau, and the white limestone based soils that roll away from the Chateau towards the west of the appellation. This remarkable single vineyard is planted to all of the 13 grape varieties authorised for use in Châteauneuf du Pape.

There has been a remarkable amount of investment at Mont-Redon over the past two decades. The entire winery has been completely renewed and is now climate controlled ensuring ideal cellar conditions.

Check out this insane $600,000 piece of winery kit. It uses vibration tables to get rid of shot berries (ones that didn’t fertilise) raisoned berries and MOG (matter other than grapes) then finally passing through an optical sorter that uses super high speed photography to identify any final pieces of undesirable material or dud grapes and uses air jets to blow them into a waste stream! Tech developed by the confectionary industry to sort out dud M&M’s!

Oak barriques have replaced the old large foudres and large temperature controlled stainless steel vats now line the walls, resulting in wines of freshness and finesse in both red and white wines. More recently two optical sorting machines at harvest time have resulted in wines of remarkable precision. Pierre Fabre has now taken over the winemaking duties and the management of the whole estate since 2017 and he has been key to driving quality to even higher levels for all the wines. Under Pierre Fabre’s leadership this is clearly an estate to watch very closely with new wines and projects well underway as well as realising the full potential of the very best vineyard sites in the Rhone Valley.

A bit of History

Châteauneuf-du-Pape literally translates to “The Pope’s new castle” and, indeed, the history of this appellation is firmly entwined with papal history. In 1308, Pope Clement V, former Archbishop of Bordeaux, relocated the papacy to the town of Avignon. Clement V and subsequent “Avignon Popes” were said to be great lovers of Burgundy wines and did much to promote it during the seventy-year duration of the Avignon Papacy. At the time, wine-growing around the town of Avignon was anything but illustrious. While the Avignon Papacy did much to advance the reputation of Burgundy wines, they were also promoting viticulture of the surrounding area, more specifically the area 5–10 km (3–6 mi) north of Avignon close to the banks of the Rhône. Prior to the Avignon Papacy, viticulture of that area had been initiated and maintained by the Bishops of Avignon, largely for local consumption.

Clement V was succeeded by John XXII who, as well as Burgundy wine, regularly drank the wines from the vineyards to the north and did much to improve viticultural practices there. Under John XXII, the wines of this area came to be known as “Vin du Pape”, this term later to become Châteauneuf-du-Pape. John XXII is also responsible for erecting the famous castle which stands as a symbol for the appellation.

The Chateauneuf appellation is 15km long and 8km wide, consisting of 3200ha, and was officially delimited in 1930. All the hills of Chateauneuf have the same geology – Miocene soil covered by Alpine diluvium-composed of a layer of marine limestone from the Miocene period, covered by a blanket of rounded stones (or “galets”) which contribute much to the wines of Chateauneuf: they retain the intense heat of the Mediterranean sun during the day then slowly disperse it to the vines during the night.

The Mistral plays a crucial role in the quality of wines from the area and blows cold and dry wind from the north through the Rhone to the Mediterranean. These winds often blow at speeds greater than 100km per hour for more than 100 days of the year and are instrumental in keeping disease at bay in the vineyards.

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The Grape Varieties of Châteauneuf

Châteauneuf-du-Pape is traditionally cited as allowing thirteen grape varieties to be used, but the 2009 version of the AOC rules in fact list eighteen varieties, since blanc (white), rose (pink) and noir (black) versions of some grapes are now explicitly listed as separate varieties. Also in the previous version of the appellation rules, Grenache and Picpoul were associated with different pruning regulations in their noir and blanc versions, bringing the number of varieties previously mentioned from thirteen to fifteen.

Red varieties allowed are Cinsaut, Counoise, Grenache noir, Mourvèdre, Muscardin, Piquepoul noir, Syrah, Terret noir, and Vaccarèse (Brun Argenté). White and pink varieties are Bourboulenc, Clairette blanche, Clairette rose, Grenache blanc, Grenache gris, Picardan, Piquepoul blanc, Piquepoul gris, and Roussanne. (The varieties not specifically mentioned before 2009 are Clairette rose, Grenache gris and Piquepoul gris.)

Both red and white varieties are allowed in both red and white Châteauneuf-du-Pape. There are no restrictions as to the proportion of grape varieties to be used, and unlike the case with other appellations, the allowed grape varieties are not differentiated into principal varieties and accessory varieties. Thus, it is theoretically possible to produce varietal Châteauneuf-du-Pape from any of the eighteen allowed varieties. In reality, most Châteauneuf-du-Pape wines are blends dominated by Grenache. Only one of every 16 bottles produced in the region is white wine.