PetNat la Folie Lucé

Next stop after Frédéric Mabileau was the Pot de Lapin in Saumur. We started with a glass of PetNat rosé. This time from a new producer – Loïc Terquem at La Folie Lucé, who has taken over Yves Drouineau's vines in Dampierre. 2009 was Terquem's first vintage. His PetNat is a little sweeter than some with attractive red fruits. Later on in the meal Olivier Thibault, owner of Le Pot, gave us Terquem's soft and fruity 2009 Saumur-Champigny to try. 

Having talked about Yves Drouineau and the quality of the wines that he made it seemed appropriate to choose a bottle of his 2000 La Seignère, Saumur-Champigny. Still quite youthful, although showing just a touch of brickiness, Yves 2000 is medium weight with attractive mellow fruit. Good for a few more years, this shows the quality of Yves as 2000 was not an easy vintage in the Loire.

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While on the subject of pétillants Jacky Blot told us that over the weekend he had decided to bring forward the first release of his Triple Zéro Rosé to this December. Bottled in January it will have had nearly 12 months sur latte by the time it is released. The rosé is a roughly equal blend of Grolleau and Gamay.    

   

Saumur and its château

If you are staying in Angers a day trip to Saumur is perfectly possible as it is only an attractive hour's drive along the banks of the Loire. It's even quicker by autoroute (A11 and A85) but less fun and you will have to pay tolls. Head out through Angers via Trélazé on the D952. This will take you along the north bank of the Loire until you reach Les Rosiers. Turn right over the bridge and then follow the Loire on the south bank to Saumur. On a sunny day this will be a very attractive drive. 

In Saumur I'd naturally have lunch at the Pot de Lapin. The Bistrot de la Place would be an alternative or if you just want a quick bite then the Brasserie de la Bourse in centre of Saumur near to the tourist office is always reliable.

There is a big choice of producers in easy reach of Saumur to go and see. Ones I would recommend include:

Château de Villeneuve (Souzay-Champigny)

Château de Targé (Parnay)

Château de Hureau (Dampierre)

Domaine de Val Brun (Parnay)

Domaine de Nerleux (St Cyr-en-Bourg)
Domaine des Roches Neuves (Varrains)

Antoine Sanzay (Varrains)
Château de Chaintres (Chaintres)

Domaine Filliatreau (Chaintres)

Among the sparkling wine houses there are Langlois-Chateau (Saint-Hilaire-Saint-Florent) and Bouvet-Ladubay (Saint-Hilaire-Saint-Florent).

See part one here.

   

Anita@Le Pot de Lapin flanked by a glass of PetNat from Antoine Sanzay

Today we had the first real spring day: bright sunshine, largely blue sky and temperatures up to 23˚C by mid-afternoon. We spent the day wandering over to Saumur – stopping to take pictures on the way (see separate post). Once again we had a very good meal. Starting with a glass of PetNat from Antoine Sanzay – red fruits balanced with good fresh acidity makes this an excellent apéritif – we all opted for the oeufs en cocotte avec fromage. This is a Pot signature dish and it was very good once again with the eggs yolks runny in the middle. To follow on I had a very sizeable entrecôte with excellent chips, while the others had a sort of shepherds' pie but made with boudin noir. Nearly defeated we opted for a single crème brûlée between the three of us.  

 

Interior of Le Pot 

We drank a very good bottle of Bruno Dubois' 2005 La Cuvée du Coin, Saumur-Champigny. Powerful and concentrated with notes of sous bois, a touch of gaminess and well integrated ripe tannins. A 2005 that is delicious to drink now but will doubtless keep well over the next five years or more.   

 

Sign of the rabbit

Olivier Thibault: chef-patron of Le Pot de Lapin

Christophe Daviau, Domaine de Bablut, with some very young wine from the 2007 vintage

La Grande Maison blog has reports on this weekend’s Portes Ouvertes (11th-13th) at Domaine de Bablut in Brissac-Quincé and reviews of three of their favourite restaurants. These are Auberge Bienvenue in Doué-la-Fontaine, Le Pot de Lapin in Saumur and La Reserve in Amboise. As readers of Jim's Loire will know Le Pot de Lapin is a firm favourite but I haven't yet tried the other two.

Vignobles Daviau, Domaine de Bablut, 49320 Brissac-Quincé.
Tel: 02.41.91.22.59
Email: daviau.contact@wanadoo.fr
Site: http://www.vignobles-daviau.fr/

La Reserve, Amboise

Auberge Bienvenue, 104 Route de Cholet, 49700 Doué-la-Fontaine. Tel: 02.41.59.22.44
www.aubergebienvenue.com/accueil.htm

Le Pot de Lapin, Les Ardilliers, 35-37 Rue Rabelais, 49400 Saumur
Tel: 02 41 67 12 86

La Réserve, 28 place Michel Debré, 37400 Amboise
Tel : 02.47.57.97.96
Email: la.reserve.amboise@orange.fr

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Other items of news
Chisseaux: new market on Wednesday mornings
Chisseaux, one of a string of villages beginning with C on the north side of the Cher, now has a market on Wednesday morning. The village is between Chenonceaux and Montrichard on the D40, which becomes the D176 once you move into Loir-et-Cher at Chissay.

Portes Ouvertes
9th-10th Mai 2009 (10.00-18.00): Domaine Joël Delaunay, 48 Rue de la Tesnière, 41110 Pouillé
Tel: 02.54.71.45.59
Email: contact@joeldelaunay.com
Site: www,joeldelaunay.com

Le tasting room blog has an interesting report on the Distillery Combier in Saumur.
letastingroom.blogspot.com/2009/04/distillerie-combier.html

Tired of all the fine weather in eastern Touraine we headed off today to Saumur to see if we could find some rain and we were all too successful! The first spots of rain arrived while we were on the A85 autoroute just to the south of Tours and it gradually increased in intensity throughout the day. However, returning to Epeigné-les-Bois in the early evening it was virtually dry and clear that there had been little rain during the day.

Once past Tours we chose a leisurely and scenic route to Saumur – heading first to Rivarennes to take pictures of the Musée de la Poire Tapée. On the way we came across the Musée Maurice Dufresne in Marnay. The Musée boasts 3000 ancient machines 'unique au monde'. The many poplar trees around Marnay and Rivarennes were wonderfully fresh and green today.

Musée de la Poire Tapée

At this time of year La Musée de la Poire Tapée is only open in the afternoon but the people who run it kindly opened it up so that I could take some pictures. The museum is small and has a small collection of the tools needed to process the pears.

Notices about the musuem – opening times etc.

Picking basket and hook for pulling down branches

The oven – pears go in on Saturday and, depending upon the type and ripeness of the pears are taken out around Tuesday

There are lots of pear and apple orchards between Azay-le-Rideau and Marnay, especially on the higher ground. Most in full bloom today.

Poplars and the River Indre@Marnay

From Rivarennes we headed to Bréhémont and then along by the Loire to Saumur just in time for lunch at Le Pot de Lapin starting with a refreshing glass of pétillant rosé – Cab à Bulles from Dominique Joseph's Le Petit Saint Vincent in Varrains. We then moved on to an excellent bottle of Antoine Sanzay's 2005 Saumur-Champigny with good concentration of black fruits, softly textured but with enough acidity to stop it from being cloying. This is the straight domaine Saumur-Champigny and unsurprisingly Antoine, who is based in Varrains, has long sold out of this vintage. My entrée was one of my favourites – oeufs en meurette – and this was very good with a deliciously rich, red wine sauce.


Underlining the popularity of le Pot de Lapin with the local vigneron our fellow diners included Bernard Jacob (boss of Ackerman Rémy Pannier Loire), Patrick Vadé (Domaine de Saint-Vincent) and Yves Lambert (Domaine Saint-Just).

The wet weather arrived soon after we got back to Epeigné and has continued with some interruptions into Saturday night (11th April). Typical Easter weather – fine until everyone starts their holiday and then downhill from there!

Still to come – part 2 of the Saumur Sortie: tastings at Château de Villeneuve, Antoine Sanzay and Château de Chaintres.

(23rd December 2008)

Fortunately we had booked because Le Pot was full. We kicked off with a coupe de Crémant de Loire Brut from Domaine des Varinelles, owned by the Daheuiller family and one Crémant de Loire Rosé from Domaine de la Petite Roche in Tremont, which is well to the south of Saumur. We were particularly impressed by the rosé.

The four of us enjoyed four good first courses: compote de lapin, onion soup, feuillette de champignons and oeufs en cocotte, the house speciality. With this we made a start on our rich and pruny 2005 Les Adrialys, Saumur-Champigny, Domaine Saint-Vincent from Patrick Vadé. As well as making good reds, Patrick’s Saumur Blanc is often impressive. The problem at Le Pot is that there is such a choice of interesting wines on the wine list that selection is not easy.



Patrick’s rich wine went particularly well with the deliciously tender biche aux girottes that two of took as well as the fine ris de veau à la crème that the other two took.

Profiteroles au chocolat followed by coffee completed an excellent meal. Le Pot de Lapin is great – just make sure you book, especially at lunchtime.

(2 October 2008)

Ami Chenin, Saumur (photo: CRM)

We stayed at Ami Chenin, a stunningly good chambres d’hôtes, run by France and Xavier Amat. They have three rooms available in an amazing semi-troglodyte house in the Rue de Beaulieu, perched above the main road from Chinon to Saumur, about 3.5 kilometres from the centre of Saumur. We chose 'L’Aunis', which cost us €75 for two – brilliant value! For this we had a large bedroom with a great view over the Loire (leaving aside all the telephone and electricity cables), a separate bathroom with shower, a little anteroom plus use of the beautiful gallery. Breakfast was a treat with three different types of baguette, homemade jams, cake and yogurt.

Xavier taking a delivery of wine from Chinon (photo: CRM)

Xavier used to run a restaurant – a bar-à-vins in Paris – before deciding about four years ago that it was time to have a more relaxed life away from the capital. In addition to their chambres d’hôtes. France and Xavier, who are passionate about wine, have two hectares of Cabernet Franc and 36 ares of Chenin Blanc. Xavier is starting to pick some of the Chenin on Saturday for their méthode ancestrale petillante. For the still red and white wines he is waiting for the grapes to ripen further and for the acidity levels to drop.

That evening we ate at the excellent Le Pot de Lapin run by Olivier Thibault. This wonderfully relaxed place opened in autumn 2007. Olivier sold his previous restaurant, L'Escargot in Saumur’s main street, because he wanted to open something less traditional and more modern in style where you can either have a glass of wine, some tapas or a meal. There is a very good wine list, especially of Saumur and Saumur-Champigny and very reasonably priced. The Champignys are listed by commune. You’ll also find a good dozen wines by the glass. The food is uncomplicated using very good ingredients and very well prepared. The menu changes frequently, while keeping some signature dishes like the deliciously creamy oeufs en cocotte. Le Pot de Lapin has rapidly become very popular with the local vignerons. Highly recommended but make sure you book as it is very small and is already justifiably popular.

We had the salade gourmande with foie gras and écrevisses and oeufs en cocotte followed by a ballotin of chicken and a tender entrecôte. As we were staying at Ami Chenin we felt we ought to try their rich, slightly honeyed 2005 Ami Chenin Saumur Blanc with a touch of minerality in the finish. Quite expensive at €38 but good to try, especially as the production is tiny and the Amats don’t have any left. We followed this with 1999 Le Clos Moleton Domaine Saint-Just from Yves Lambert. A Loire Châteauneuf-du-Pape – turning bricky with rich curranty, raisiny fruit, this probably needs to be drunk fairly soon. The label says 13% alc but it seems higher than that. Olivier kindly pulled out the 2006 Clos Moleton for us to try – obviously fresher and can be drunk now but will improve with another year or two in bottle.

Ami Chenin, 37 rue de Beaulieu, 49400 Saumur
Tel: 02 41 38 13 17, mobile: 06 68 05 57 98
Email: ami.chenin@wanadoo.fr
Web: www.amichenin.com

Le Pot de Lapin, Les Ardilliers, 35-37 Rue Rabelais, 49400 Saumur
Tel: 02 41 67 12 86
The restaurant is closed on Sundays and Mondays

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