Wine Review - 2009 Hegarty Les Chamans Blanc: White Minervois That Rocks

This wine was a recommendation from Jason MacPhee at Bishop's Cellar who mentioned how great it was at a recent tasting in the store. He really knows his stuff (especially French wines) so it was all we needed to pick this one up. He forewarned us that this wine might be a little cloudy but on purpose. The Hegarty Les Chamans vineyard is in the Minervois region in the Languedoc and the wine is Marsanne 50% and Roussanne 50% and both barrel fermented and barrel aged and you can surely tell.  

Come to find out that slight cloudiness is caused by natural proteins in the wine and is really cool looking. It is a golden coloured wine (think apple juice) but even more than that it is slightly thick on the swirl.  Just a great looking wine and with that cloudiness, definitely unique.

The nose is pure butterscotch with strong undertones of bananas and spiced apples.  The oak clearly shines on this wine but a super surprising component is there are clearly red wine smells that come off this wine. We are thinking there might be some components of the Marsanne twisted up with the oak to give this really interesting red wine smell.

The flavour are really interesting with a touch of sugar that sits on top of a kick of cayenne.  Really great and when you throw in the buttery/oaky notes...wow.  The fruit is pure Granny Smith apple and is so balanced with a great crisp acidity and the sugar.  Hands down this is the best and most unique white wine of the year.

	Tasting Notes:	Score:
Sight (0-5)	Golden coloured and cloudy with a thickness in the glass. Super cool.	4.5
Smell (0-5)	Butterscotch with bananas, spiced apples, oak and red wine notes.	4.5
Taste (0-10)	Buttery Granny Smith apples with good crisp acidity and a kick of cayenne op top of the residual sugar.	9.0
	Total:	18.0 / 20 (90%)

This wine is priced at just around $25 locally and worth every single solitary penny.  Totally amazing and so unique.  If you have an extra $25 hanging around, use it to buy this wine.

Keep on tasting!

Chris & Shannon