Wine Review - 2009 Frederic Mabileau Les Rouillères

This wine was a purchase based upon the recommendation of one of the staff at Bishop's Cellar here in Halifax (@BishopsCellar).  We were inquiring about their Chinon/Cab Franc selection and he mentioned this wine from Frederic Mabileau in the St. Nicolas De Bourgueil region in the Loire Valley, which they found on a recent purchasing trip to the Loire.  This is a smaller producer who makes a lot of Cab Franc based wines.  This particular one was a favorite of theirs, so much so, they imported some for sale.

Being we are on the hunt for good Cab Franc, we purchased this one which is just a bit outside our normal purchase price range at $27 Cdn.  So, we decided to break into this one tonight to give it a try.  Once opened and decanted, we noticed right off that the wine is unfiltered and cloudy.  This added a lot of flavour to the wine but also added a slight chaulkiness to it as well (very slight).  The other obvious and interesting thing we noticed is that it totally tasted like a New World wine.  It was super reminiscent of the Niagara Cab Francs we tried last summer.  It smelled of that familiar barnyard scent we love along with the herbaceous and vegetal notes typical of the varietal. 

In our opinion, you really need to like those aspects in the wine otherwise it will be a strange drinking experience.  Some people will just not enjoy that level of funkiness in the wine.

Overall, this is a great example of Cabernet Franc.  It is an elegant and luscious wine with all the cilantro and green pepper notes we love but throw in an almost perfumed/soapy smell (in a good way) and you get a nice tasting experience.

	Tasting Notes:	Score:
Sight (0-5)	Cloudy, Ruby red wine with a slightly thick viscosity	4.0
Smell (0-5)	Vegetal with herbal notes with a soapy smell in there along with some ripe berry notes.	4.5
Taste (0-10)	Medium to full bodied wine with bold flavours of green pepper and cilantro (and Thrills gum if anyone remembers that). A great example of Cab Franc!	9.0
	Total:	17.5 / 20  (87.5%)

If you feel like experimenting with your palate give this one a try.

Keep on drinking!

Chris & Shannon