Biodynamic. The Chenin Blanc vines of Clos Romans are rooted in the walled enclave of a priory dating back to the 11th century. The soil consists of a 30cm layer of sandy clay over Senonian-era limestone bedrock called Pierres de Champigny, the same rock that was used to build Château Champigny. Planted atop a ridge in Parnay, just outside Saumur, the vine roots burrow down through the limestone, towards the famous troglodyte dwellings below. Germain acquired this historic site in 2007 and has been steadily replanting at a density of 10,000 vines per hectare. He practices massale selection, mixing plants to ensure he doesn’t get a mono-dimensional profile of this terroir. For the 2018, the grapes were hand-picked, whole-bunch pressed and then fermented in a neutral oval cask, where the wine rested for eight months on lees.
It's a is super-perfumed with acacia flower and fine honey notes leading a dramatically intense, crystalline, mineral-bound and soaringly pure Chenin, with those same, dazzling, floral/honey notes but also ripe grapefruit and pear, loads of old-vine structure, intense, rocky/mineral notes, and a lifted, saline finish. This is surely one of the great whites of the region: a super mineral Corton-Charlemagne in the heart of the Loire. Worth every cent.