August has been a great month for wine, this time both in terms of quality and quantity. Even though we were on the road a bit, we’ve done much more entertaining than usual so the bottle count is up. Discarding a few ordinary bottles there turned out to be over twenty wines worth writing about, so for August I’m going to split them into three parts.

For the first part there are seven wines from Eastern Hungary, Corsica, Arbois, Southern Burgundy (a new to me but remarkable Aligoté), Champagne, Pupillin and Tuscany. It has to be said that even though I try to bring you only the best and the most interesting, there are some veritable gems here. To be honest, the excitement carries through the whole month.

Robin 2021, Annamária Réka-Koncz (Barabás, Eastern Hungary)

Although I wrote about this cuvée from Annamária earlier this year, that was the 2020 vintage, and this is her 2021. It’s worth repeating what I’ve said about this lady’s wines before, they seem to get better and better as the years progress.

It’s a blend of Királyleányka (60%) and Furmint (30%), with 10% Rhine Riesling. The Furmint is from a friend’s vines at Mád (in Tokaj), the rest coming from Annamária’s vines at Barabás. The overwhelming essence of this wine is its minerality, which seems to be accentuated by the bubbles. The Furmint is very old vine stock so maybe that’s not really surprising. However, Eastern Hungary’s rare, autochthonous Királyleányka (I’m told it is now strongly disputed that it is the same variety as Romania’s Feteasca Regala) does add fruit and a savoury quality.

The 2021 tastes perhaps slightly drier and more “direct” than I remember the 2020 did, but that may be on account of its greater youth. I think I prefer the 2021, though I did like the previous vintage. It doesn’t taste like a 13% pétnat sparkling wine, as the label suggests. We opened the 2020 for friends not used to natural wines and they thought it funky. The friend we opened this 2021 for thought it was amazing (maximum points to Anna there).

Imported by Basket Press Wines, who I believe have sold out. Prost Wines may have some left (£27).

Clos Canarelli 2020, Corse Figari Rosé (Corsica, France)

This represents one of an increasing number of exceptional yet expensive Rosé wines that tempt us each summer. It comes from Corsica’s south. The grapes, 50% Sciaccarellu with 30% Niellucciu and 20% Grenache, all planted in the late 1990s, were 90% direct-pressed, lightly, at Tarabucetta, to make a pale pink wine.

The vines grow on a granite plateau, a stony terroir with altitude. This, and the prevailing wind, ameliorates the temperatures usually associated with Corsica, and you can tell. The vine age also adds to the mix so that we have a wine that is delicate and floral on the nose, but on the palate, it has a certain mineral streak and a stoniness. I’m sure that the texture also comes from the ageing it undergoes in cement tanks. There are red fruits, and hints of darker fruit too. The palate even has a little peachy stone fruit which adds a hint of gras. Just a hint.

Although I did seem to complain that it’s expensive, well, actually I think £36 is still less than some of the fashionable fine wine Rosés we see, and I guarantee it’s a step up from the £15-£20 crowd if you want to add some complexity to your summer drinking. Or indeed, in this case, into autumn. I couldn’t find mention of it in Elizabeth Gabay’s book (Rosé, Infinite Ideas, 2018), but I can vouch for its quality.

From The Solent Cellar (£36). They also have Canarelli’s Blanc for £45, which I haven’t tasted.

Arbois Trousseau “Cuvée Bérangères” 2016, Jacques Puffeney (Jura, France)

Since the so-called Pope of Arbois (no idea, is he a religious man?) sold his vines and retired every bottle of his wine we drink is one of a finite number, which somehow makes it more of a treat to drink one than before. That said, I have always found his wines gave me as much pleasure as any of the other big names of the Jura region.

After selling/leasing his vines to Domaine de la Pélican in 2014 he continued to make a little Trousseau, until 2017 I think (and kept all his remaining stocks of red, white and yellow wine for his pension). Bérangères is a single vineyard, old vines (around 35-y-o) on a south-facing slope of gravel soils, and boy can you taste the gravel. Ageing is in large old oak, usually en foudre.

Sniff this and the fruit wells up from the depths. Red fruit, darker fruit, and then spice, like pepper and nutmeg. The palate is mineral, but like a light crispness more than a heavy texture. There’s great smoothness here too, very plummy and with more than a hint of classic mulberry. At seven years old it’s sensational in every way. Complex and long, it’s a fine testament to this master winemaker. I’d love to open a bottle for Parisian friends who seem to delight in sneering at Jura wines, but I noticed that Cork & Cask in Edinburgh have a single bottle left…£95. Above my budget but someone will be very lucky. Another wine merchant in England listed it for £120. Vine Trail imported it.

Bouzeron Clos de la Fortune Vieilles Vignes 2021, Maison Chanzy (Burgundy, France)

I had never come across this domaine before, even though I’ve written about Aligoté (one of my perennially popular articles), and come to think of it, “maison” sounds like a negoce wine, doesn’t it. Well, it isn’t. Chanzy make this Aligoté from the Clos de la Fortune, a well-known climat with a southeast exposure near Bouzeron, in part enclosed by the walls of an old fortification.

A mere 902 bottles of this VV version were made and that accounts for its price (you may see the higher production version for sale at half the price, which I haven’t tried). The vines are very old, genuinely VV, planted in 1960. Harvested slightly late, in September, ageing was sixteen months in oak.

This is certainly 100% Aligoté, but I could swear it tastes as if there’s a good 50% Chardonnay in here. It has acidity, but not “Aligoté levels” of acidity. The oak has smoothed it out, and there’s a definite vanilla element here, but if the oak was at all new you can’t tell. I’m not really sure how this tastes like a wine that saw new oak that is all well integrated at two years old. It feels like there’s an alchemy going on because the bottle we drank was truly exceptional. It has a lot more going on than in most of Southern Burgundian Aligoté, despite how far this variety has come on in the past twenty years.

I said it was expensive and this is £40 at The Solent Cellar in Lymington. But as an Aligoté lover, I did like it a lot. I think Alliance Wine is the importer. You can purchase their white Mercurey from the same source for £35.

Champagne Val Frison “Lalore” Blanc de Blancs Brut Nature [2019] (Champagne, France)

Válerie Frison made the wine at this Ville-sur-Arce domain (Côte des Bar) with her then husband, Thierry de Marne, and subsequently on her own after 2013 until 2019, and established this Grower label as one of the emerging stars of the region. Her son, Thomas de Marne, returned to the domaine in 2018, and he took over winemaking in 2020. So, unless I’m mistaken this wine comes from Válerie’s last vintage.

“Lalore” is a zero-dosage cuvée made from 100% Chardonnay, aged in old Chablis barrels. It comes off a single parcel on Portlandian soil, unusual for this part of the Côte where Kimmeridgean clays are more common. Of the six hectares planted at the domaine, only around one-and-a-quarter hectares is Chardonnay, so this cuvée has sometimes been harder to get hold of.

Disgorged in April 2022, this had over two years on lees and a little over a year in bottle, post-disgorging. It has a creamy, nutty feel from the Chardonnay, but where it differs from a lot of Chardonnay from the Aube is in its intense minerality. Although the soils are different, you do think a little of Chablis, which after all isn’t too far away. However, the minerality isn’t too upfront or raw.

The wine is very drinkable, smooth, a little candied fruit on the top and that mineral streak down below. Very high quality, so long as you appreciate zero dosage (which I don’t worry about in the warmer wines of the south. After all, I’m now used to English Sparkling wines which can have more acidity even with dosage).

If you can find a bottle it should cost you around £65. Try The Good Wine Shop (various London locations). They might alternatively have “Goustan”, the Blanc de Noirs cuvée. These Champagnes are actually good value for the quality.

Arbois-Pupillin 2015, Maison Pierre Overnoy/Houillon-Overnoy (Jura, France)

Pupillin is the small village just outside of Arbois which claims to be the world capital of Ploussard. This is true, although as everyone else spells it Poulsard, they don’t really have any rivals in this respect. It’s an attractive village with some rather nice vineyard walks and a very good restaurant, and there are nice off-piste options to walk to and from it, from Arbois, if you do a little research.

Not too far into the village, past the church, on the right-hand side of the road, you’ll see one of the most famous metal signs in viticultural France, advertising Pierre Overnoy and the domaine now known as Houillon-Overnoy (the domaine being taken over by Manu Houillon, Pierre’s long time assistant, after his retirement). The wines here are as enigmatic as their labels, but they are unquestionably among the finest natural wines in France. They are now, sadly, as seems the way, impossible to find at a price most lovers of natural wines can afford.

I say, in this case with a hint of bitterness as well as sadness, that wines I used to buy in London at quite strange places (Wholefoods, the US chain’s shop in South Kensington, for example) are now largely drunk by rich men or wine merchants who buy their allocation themselves at trade price.

All this leads to me saying that drinking Overnoy is a big occasion for me. I’m drinking wine I never expected to taste again. What do we have here? An off-white wax capsule which does not state overtly its contents. Whilst some said “surely it’s Savagnin”, it tasted like Chardonnay to me. Although I wasn’t so confident as to disagree too vehemently, research shows (I think) that it was indeed Chardonnay, but possibly (?) blended with some Savagnin. It doesn’t matter one bit.

Lemony, waxy, with orange and apricot and a mineral core are a few descriptors to start with but to be quite frank that list should go on and on. One word suffices, sensational. I feel very lucky to have drunk this and I’d have this accompany my last meal any day.

The friend who very kindly opened this bought it at Plateau in Brighton, back when they’d sell you an Overnoy to take away. I got a red at the same time but it is long gone. Cost? Priceless.

Pian del Ciampolo 2016, Montevertine (Tuscany, Italy)

Some readers will remember that I used to go to Tuscan themed lunches pre-Covid, latterly at Kew’s sadly missed Glasshouse (my final visit there was in June last year where, ironically, I had a meal every bit as good as in any of Nigel Platts-Martin’s remaining restaurants). My confession is that I’m very low on all Italian wines in the cellar, not just Tuscan bottles. I do keep trying to put that right. This was another bottle a friend opened, and I don’t think he knew I’m such a fan of this estate.

Montevertine is at Radda in Chianti, and its name stands proud as its founder, the late Sergio Manetti, was a vocal supporter of the region, and created one of its liquid icons, Le Pergole Torte. This is an estate which continues to this day to shout out for the artisans against coporate Chianti.

Pian del Ciampolo is the entry level wine, but don’t let that fool you. It costs around £56. Next step up is Montevertine itself, which I reckon I bought for £30-£40 a few years ago. Well, now you pay £120, and Pergole Torte? £225! No wonder my bank manager thinks I should give up this wine thing.

Anyway, Pian del Ciampolo is a blend of Sangiovese (specifically the Sangioveto clone) along with Canaiolo and Colorino, an ideal Merlot-free Chianti Classico blend, except vehemently IGT. As all good Chianti should be, it is extremely food-friendly, specifically game-friendly with some bottle age.

It’s fermented in cement tank and aged a year in oak. It is red-fruited yet savoury with a hint of Bovril. Very complex already and long on the palate. It’s a wonderful wine and when you drink it you do remember just how good this estate’s so-called better wines taste. They are but a distant memory. Sic Transit Gloria Mundi…but thank the gods for friends who open wines like this.

All these three estate wines are available from The Solent Cellar (Lymington) at the prices quoted, but will of course be available at other fane wane merchants.