Pineau, a word widely used in France as a synonym for the pinot family of grape varieties. It seems to have been a portmanteau word for any better-quality vine in medieval France (probably a reference to the pine-cone shape of so many bunches of grapes) but is today a word associated primarily with the Loire. It is the first word of a wide range of vine synonyms, sometimes various forms of Pinot but often chenin, most notably as Pineau de la Loire.
© Jancis Robinson and Oxford University Press 1994, 1999, 2006, 2015
