Jasnières

Jasnières, white wine appellation of just 50 ha/124 acres in an enclave within the less favourably exposed Coteaux du loir district in the northern Loire. The appellation all but expired in the 1950s but Joël Gigou at Domaine de la Charrière and others such as Domaine Renard-Potaire have injected new passion into the making of these traditionally dry wines from the Chenin Blanc grape. Locals see Jasnières as ‘the savennières of Touraine’, so dry and steely are these traditional wines in their youth, and so well do they respond to bottle ageing. In particularly ripe vintages since the late 1980s, however, extraordinarily rich, appley, botrytized wines have been fashioned, either dry or sweet according to the extent of noble rot infection. The soils are characterized by their high flint content, on the south-east-facing slopes on the north bank of the Loir. Annual production of Jasnières is about double that of white Coteaux du Loir. See also loire, including map.