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Chateau Lafitte: Natural Sweet Wines in Jurançon
We came to visit Antoine Arraou from Chateau Lafitte at the end of March 2022 during our last trip to the Southwest of France. The last time we met him was at the Raw Wine Fair in New York in 2019 and prior to that I visited the winery in 2015. Every time I see him, I’m amazed by how much has changed.
History of Chateau Lafitte
The name Chateau Lafitte refers to the name of a former lord’s chateau that still exists on the property, just next to the winery. This name and estate were first mentioned in historical records in the 14th century. Today, the winery and chateau sit on a hill overlooking the village of Monein, considered to be the capital of Jurançon wine. Part of this village rests on what was once part of the property of this estate. Historically, grapes and wine have always been an important part of Chateau Lafitte.
About 30 years ago, Philippe and Brigitte Arraou bought Chateau Lafitte with the idea of restoring the house and to start producing wine on the land again. Antoine, their son, grew up in the chateau. Sounds great I hear you say! Well, now imagine spending winter in a big castle, with no insulation and a leaking roof. Not as fun right?! It may have been rough at times but in a way it’s certainly what created the identity of Chateau Lafitte. After such an experience, they don’t fear getting out of their comfort zone to keep improving.
Philippe and Brigitte were running their vineyard organically. In 2012 Antoine took over the estate, he began converting the vineyards to biodynamics and started making some natural wines. By 2020 all the wines, including the sweet wines, were being made without any additives or sulfites. It shows you how this family is always pushing boundaries to keep improving their wine.
Biodynamics in the Vineyard
The soil of the vineyard consists of silt and clay with different percentages of each in different spots. The bottom of the slope has mostly clay and the higher you go, the more silt you find.
This part of France gets a lot of rain and is pretty humid, but stays relatively warm. Those are ideal conditions for the growth of Downy Mildew, a fungus that if left unchecked can ruin a whole crop of grapes. For an organic vineyard without the use of pesticides, it can be very tricky to manage. For Antoine, it requires a great deal of observation to understand his vineyard and to know when to spray to prevent diseases. Some of the treatments he uses include copper (allowed in organic farming), along with some biodynamic preparations and plant infusions which strengthen the grapevines against diseases.
Antoine has a strong belief in biodynamic farming. After 10 years of biodynamics, he can feel that his soil and vines are healthier, and give more balanced grapes. According to him, he wouldn’t be able to make natural wines if he didn’t use these biodynamic practices. Biodiversity is encouraged here; with a variety of plants, grains, and fruit trees growing on the land. He also puts sheep in the vineyard to graze in the winter.
An Eco-Friendly Winery
Before talking about the wine or how it’s made, let’s talk about where it’s made, the winery. In 2018, a new winery was built to increase the quality of work and wine. It was designed to make work as easy as possible while also aligning with their ecological beliefs. Here are the main advantages:
– It’s self-sufficient in electricity thanks to solar panels
– Rain water is caught and used to clean tractors and machines
– It’s built into a hill and equipped with a Canadian well to ensure a natural coolness all year round
– It’s built using different levels to allow the use of gravity to move the wine, instead of using a pump. It’s a gentler process that makes for better wines.
The Dry Wines
On our visit there was no wine left to sell; another sign of the quality of the wines at Chateau Lafitte. We were able to taste a few unreleased wines straight from the barrels and other containers and quickly came to the conclusion that there are no lesser wines here. All of these wines are very serious and worthy of consideration.
The entry level white is made mostly of Petit Manseng with a touch of Gros Manseng. It’s aged for about 9 months in 400 liters oak barrels.
The 1 Liter bottle comes from an old plot planted in 1958 with mostly Petit Manseng and Gros Manseng. But there are some older varieties here as well, both red and white, including Claverie, Manseng Noir and even Tannat. This wine is aged around 10 months in a cement egg.
The Cuvee Argile (Argile is clay in French) is made with 100% Petit Manseng coming from… yes, you guessed it, clay soil! And because Antoine never does things halfway, the bottle itself is made out of clay. Originally this cuvee was aged in clay pots but since 2020, he has changed to aging in sandstone amphoras to increase the quality. Oh, and a little warning, the Argile bottles are 50cl so don’t make the same mistake as me and drink it with 4 people at the table, 2 max! 😉
The Cuvee Orange is also made with 100% Petit Manseng, but is macerated for a month on the skins. After maceration the wine is aged in the clay amphoras; the same amphoras that Antoine previously used for Argile.
Natural Sweet Wines
It’s incredibly complicated to make a sweet wine without any sulfites. The main challenge is to stabilize a sweet wine. The best way to get a stable wine is to ferment all the sugar, but then it’s not sweet. That’s one of the main reasons why natural winemakers usually don’t make sweet wines, at least not on purpose. But sweet wines are king in Jurançon, and Antoine started some experiments in 2016 and currently sells two different cuvees of sweet wines.
Sol I Serena (Sun and Serenity in Catalan)
This Catalan method consists of putting the wine outdoors to ferment in 25 liter Dame Jeanne, leaving it totally exposed to the weather conditions, until the wine is stable. Antoine uses only Petit Manseng grapes harvested very late with a potential degree of alcohol of at least 20% ABV. It takes about 4 years of sitting outside during day, night, summer and winter to get a stable wine with around 12 degrees of alcohol and a nice sweetness to it. You can think of it as a kind of natural “pasteurizing”. This method also gives to the wine a bit of volatile acidity that beautifully balances with the sweetness.
We tried the 2018, which is not yet ready to be sold, and it already has an amazing freshness, fruit and length. It was surprisingly super smashable, something you don’t often expect from a sweet wine. Obviously, the aesthetic of the bottle is also original, its shape is meant to remind us of the Dame Jeanne it was aged in. The label is engraved on the bottle and to stay true to the theme, the top is also made of glass.
Mémoire (Memory in French)
For this wine Antoine uses a solera method, a method commonly used in Spain to make Sherry. In a solera, some barrels are stacked on top of each other and each year some of the wine from the bottom barrel is bottled. Wine from the barrel on top replaces it, which is itself replaced by the barrel on top. The very top barrel receives the new wine from that year. By using this method, all vintages are blended together, which gives a similar quality and taste to the wine throughout the years. But the main reason Antoine uses this method is to stabilize the wine. His idea is that the older, stable wine will give the information on how to behave to become stable to the new, younger wine. The older wine acts as a teacher or mentor sharing its experiences and memories, hence the name, Mémoire.
So far, the method only slows down the fermentation but doesn’t stop it totally. “It might take decades before it works, it’s a generational project”, says Antoine. In the meantime, this wine is stabilized by adding some alcohol to the wine after the solera and before bottling, making a fortified wine. The alcohol comes from the super talented, Laurent Cazottes in Gaillac, and is made from the pomace (or the leftover solids after pressing the grapes) of the same grapes that the wine is made of.
Chateau Lafitte leaves the Appellation Jurançon
Ironically, while pushing the boundaries to express best the terroir of Jurançon, Antoine’s wines have become too original and too different to still be within the rules of the appellation of Jurançon. Because of this he can no longer call his wines Jurançon, and instead sells his wine with Vin de France on the label.
Not having to fight over this appellation has freed a lot of time and mental space for him. So He is now able to be more involved in a community of like-minded winegrowers from the Southwest of France. He organizes a small wine fair, called Grandeur Nature at his winery with some of these winegrowers. He is very involved in the local biodynamic community and always happy to give a hand to young growers that are starting their journey. He’s also starting to buy grapes, a process that he finds more interesting than expected. It’s a new challenge and another way to connect with new people, grape varieties and terroirs.
Parting Words
As you can see, we had a great time at Chateau Lafitte. It was really interesting to see the huge improvement Antoine has made to his vineyard in the 7 years since I have visited. A big problem of the region is that it’s everyone for himself. Here, it’s good to see Antoine and others giving a more collaborative dynamic to Jurançon and to the broader Southwest of France. I can’t wait to go back in several years to witness how much better it will become!
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P.S. For more information about sweet wines, you might like 6 Fascinating Ways to Make Dessert Wine. For more Southwest of France wineries, check out Domaine Capmartin: Harnessing The Power of Tannat.
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Great article that explains a lot and make me want to go visit the Chateau as soon as possible!