2022 Domaine Cartaux Bougaud – Château de Quintigny, Pinot Noir, Côtes du Jura, France.
I had not had the wines by Domaine Cartaux Bougaud in the Jura before this brilliant, dark ruby, delicate Pinot Noir AOC Côtes du Jura offering recently, which impressed me with lovely clarity and mineral tones and a medium silky body. The mouth is classic Pinot fruit with black cherry, briar laced raspberry, plum and blood orange layers, a nice mix of tea spices, a touch of truffle, earth, crushed roses and a lingering chalky note. The vineyards of Cartaux-Bougaud, I read, are planted on gentle to relatively steep limestone rock and marl sites with variations of clay, sand and silt topsoil mostly derived from the underlying bedrock, and sit between 250 and 300 meters of altitude. The wines, including the reds, like this Pinot Noir, see cool, mostly natural fermentations and the wine is in aged close to 12 months a combination of vessels including stainless steel, enameled concrete vats and ancient 228-liter French oak. Winemaker Sébastien Cartaux, I understand, is looking for transparency and purity, wanting to impart more savory notes, less fruity in profile, alongside the lifted fruit and flower aromas, which he implies is a more terroir driven personality or profile. I also tasted the AOC L’Étoile Chardonnay, which I liked, but this Pinot Noir stood out for the quality and it is definitely a wine to look out for and one I plan to buy for personal use.
The Jura’s Domaine Cartaux Bougaud, run by Sébastien and his wife Sandrine Cartaux who took over from their parents, Anne-Marie Bougaud and Guy Cartaux in 1993, is a small family estate that is relatively young for the region, with their first harvest done back in 1973 on a small parcel in L’Étoile area. The 20-hectare estate, which was organic-certified in 2022 produces Chardonnay and Savagnin from AOC L’Étoile, as well as reds made from Poulsard, Trousseau, and Pinot Noir, as seen here, from the Côtes du Jura. Their wines, according to the Cartaux’s importer The Source Imports, are crafted in numerous cellars, including the ancient Château de Quintigny, again as seen here with the Pinot Noir, using both traditional “ouillage” method with air space left in the barrel and the region’s unique oxidative aging process, essential for producing the renowned Vin Jaune, as well as topped up barrel wines, which show off a cleaner and fresher profile. The terroir here, as noted above, has the Jurassic era limestone soils, like the Chardonnay and Pinot Noir areas of Burgundy, which allows those varietals to really shine here, as this one does, but there’s also their Savagnin, Poulsard, Trousseau and Gamay to look forward to, plus Cartaux does some sparkling wines, which I hope to sample in the near future. The Jura is still a mystery and remains a region on the rise with a mix of old school and modern wines, plus a new generation also starting to make their present felt, there’s never been a better time to explore it.
($35 Est.) 92 Points, grapelive