Roubine Sablet 2022
Eric Ughetto used to fight fires in Paris. His wife Sophie used to be a welder. In 2000 they returned home to Gigondas in the southern Rhone to take over the family’s gnarly old vine plots in Vacqueyras, Sablet and of course, Gigondas.
They are salt of the earth type people; welcoming and self-effacing, quietly confident and comfortable in the way they tend their vineyards (no pesticides, no herbicides, certified organic) as well as their authentic and disarming style of the wines. These are people and wines that remind me that France still holds so many wine treasures beyond the palaver and egos of Burgundy, Bordeaux and their ilk.
Here, you can still breathe in the garrigue covered hills when you get out of the car but then smell it again when you stick your nose in the glass, or glance at the granite jags in the nearby Dentelles du Montmirail mountains and feel that coolness and mineral drive as the wines travel across the palate. Here, it’s still possible to glimpse the concept of terroir in all its glory.
Last year I went back for the first time in years and refreshingly, nothing has changed. Eric is a little greyer but he’s the same jovial and welcoming vigneron he’s always been. His tiny cellar has not grown and he still clambers across the barrels to pull samples to try. Not a small feat given he’s built like a front rower.
He shows us wines that are brimming with authenticity, wines that are big on flavour and big on the smells of the surrounding hills. They are honest and engaging, much like their owner. I’ve always thought wines, like dogs, resemble their masters.
Later he cooks local sausages over coals and we drink his superb wines and at that stage I feel like I can die a happy man. This is when wine is at its most powerful, with complimentary food and with friends and a few laughs. Simply, the best.
Ughetto keeps winemaking fairly simple. Alcoholic fermentation is in concrete and whole bunch is prevalent across the crus (he makes Gigondas of course and Vacqueyras). So too is some post fermentation maceration to elongate and calm the tannin profile. After that, it’s straight into wooden vat (never small new wood) and, voila, that’s it.
It’s this simplicity in the methodology as well as the primacy and quality of the fruit that is the main driver of wines here and that’s what you feel in each wine. Each is subtly different to the other (as you would expect) but all share a wonderful openness and disarming quality. I might also say, they all highlight the greatness of grenache as translator of soil and site. Immediacy, aromatic purity and nuance but also texture and chew on the palate.
My favourite wine in his range and one of my favourite wines full stop is his fabulous Sablet. Here soil turn to sand and sandstone. This accentuates more structure and muscle but also the aromatics range from florals and herbs through to hung meat and charcuterie. It’s a more swashbuckling style that reflects the openness of the people and the country. Not simple though, more an openness and rusticity in the best sense. I love it.
This is the wine I wanted to highlight today and offer it at a special price. It’s a great vintage in the region; the 22’s have ripeness and a deeply pitched fruit and floral profile but they have freshness and vigour to burn. I love this wine always but in a vintage like 2022 there’s simply nothing better and, as we enter into the cooler months and start thinking about more comforting food then you’ve got to have this wine on hand. It’s mandatory in my house all year round but when it turns cooler, then it’s a catastrophe if we run out.
Finally, something I wrote a couple of years back about these wines I think is worth repeating. These wines are a time capsule of a style of French wines that eloquently communicate terroir and the agricultural underpinnings and geology of a place. They were once everywhere but these days they can only be found in the less fashionable districts of the French wine landscape. Long may it be so!
Cheers
Michael McNamara
They are salt of the earth type people; welcoming and self-effacing, quietly confident and comfortable in the way they tend their vineyards (no pesticides, no herbicides, certified organic) as well as their authentic and disarming style of the wines. These are people and wines that remind me that France still holds so many wine treasures beyond the palaver and egos of Burgundy, Bordeaux and their ilk.
Here, you can still breathe in the garrigue covered hills when you get out of the car but then smell it again when you stick your nose in the glass, or glance at the granite jags in the nearby Dentelles du Montmirail mountains and feel that coolness and mineral drive as the wines travel across the palate. Here, it’s still possible to glimpse the concept of terroir in all its glory.
Last year I went back for the first time in years and refreshingly, nothing has changed. Eric is a little greyer but he’s the same jovial and welcoming vigneron he’s always been. His tiny cellar has not grown and he still clambers across the barrels to pull samples to try. Not a small feat given he’s built like a front rower.
He shows us wines that are brimming with authenticity, wines that are big on flavour and big on the smells of the surrounding hills. They are honest and engaging, much like their owner. I’ve always thought wines, like dogs, resemble their masters.
Later he cooks local sausages over coals and we drink his superb wines and at that stage I feel like I can die a happy man. This is when wine is at its most powerful, with complimentary food and with friends and a few laughs. Simply, the best.
Ughetto keeps winemaking fairly simple. Alcoholic fermentation is in concrete and whole bunch is prevalent across the crus (he makes Gigondas of course and Vacqueyras). So too is some post fermentation maceration to elongate and calm the tannin profile. After that, it’s straight into wooden vat (never small new wood) and, voila, that’s it.
It’s this simplicity in the methodology as well as the primacy and quality of the fruit that is the main driver of wines here and that’s what you feel in each wine. Each is subtly different to the other (as you would expect) but all share a wonderful openness and disarming quality. I might also say, they all highlight the greatness of grenache as translator of soil and site. Immediacy, aromatic purity and nuance but also texture and chew on the palate.
My favourite wine in his range and one of my favourite wines full stop is his fabulous Sablet. Here soil turn to sand and sandstone. This accentuates more structure and muscle but also the aromatics range from florals and herbs through to hung meat and charcuterie. It’s a more swashbuckling style that reflects the openness of the people and the country. Not simple though, more an openness and rusticity in the best sense. I love it.
This is the wine I wanted to highlight today and offer it at a special price. It’s a great vintage in the region; the 22’s have ripeness and a deeply pitched fruit and floral profile but they have freshness and vigour to burn. I love this wine always but in a vintage like 2022 there’s simply nothing better and, as we enter into the cooler months and start thinking about more comforting food then you’ve got to have this wine on hand. It’s mandatory in my house all year round but when it turns cooler, then it’s a catastrophe if we run out.
Finally, something I wrote a couple of years back about these wines I think is worth repeating. These wines are a time capsule of a style of French wines that eloquently communicate terroir and the agricultural underpinnings and geology of a place. They were once everywhere but these days they can only be found in the less fashionable districts of the French wine landscape. Long may it be so!
Cheers
Michael McNamara