The jewel in the crown for Jerome, you can see in the image above the vineyard, it is a beautiful, isolated spot and you can see the care with which it is tended, literally no expense is spared. To counter frost, he has installed electric, thermal guiding wire at a cost of 200K euro per hectare. In addition, he has hired 4 full time staff to take care of the vineyards, all this extra cost has meant an increase in the price of the wines, as you will notice. Still, I feel as do the French press, that he is now without peer in his region, thus on that basis his wines are priced quite fairly.   

Muscadet "Granit" is from granite soils and old vines planted in 1920; this produces very fine, very mineral wine; tight as a drum yet silken and sensual, it tastes of flint and flowers and is very inspired drinking. Next time one of your customers asks you about 'terroir' you could pour them a glass of this by way of explanation. This is one of the great Muscadet's available today and a special bottle that will keep for years if you have the patience. Really stunning

After a disastrous frost in 1709 wiped out most of the mediocre red grapes that were originally planted around Nantes, Louis XIV ordered the growers to come up with a white replacement. They chose a Burgundian grape called the melon, actually an offshoot of Gamay, the grape of Beaujolais.

Jerome Bretaudeau set up on his own in 2005 having made wine for others for the previous 10 years, notably Jo Landron at Domaine de la Louvetrie.

His Domaine de Belle-Vue is today one of the leading lights in the region and the quality of his wines is outstanding, indeed there is an underground buzz on these wines amongst France’s best wine bars and bistros.

Three things set him way apart from the rest and are the reason that his wines are so good; he harvests by hand, his vines yield only 35hl/ha (in a region where 90hl/ha is normal!) and he only uses the available natural yeasts for fermentation. With these principles in mind, Bretaudeau stands beside others in our portfolio like Belliviere, Tue-Boeuf and Foillard.

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