Edmond Vatan Sancerre Clos la Neore, Loire, France Magnum 1.5L 2018

Over the past decade, Edmond and Anne Vatan’s Sancerre “Clos la Néore” has gone, from virtually unknown outside the Loire, to becoming a top prize among sommeliers, merchants and connoisseurs worldwide.

What they realize is that, from this small plot within Les Monts Damnés—Sancerre’s greatest vineyard—and through methods little-changed from those used by their family since the French Revolution, the Vatans fashion transcendently complex, very long-lived Sancerre that is among the world’s most riveting white wines.

In fact, in how extraordinarily it develops with age, Vatan’s Clos la Néore has more in common with a Raveneau or Dauvissat Chablis than with most Sancerres. As View from the Cellar’s John Gilman has written, “In many regards I find that the wines of the Raveneau brothers and Monsieur Vatan are quite analogous in terms of evolutionary cycles and their potential for profundity with sufficient bottle age.”

The awakening of the wine world to Clos la Néore’s brilliance has coincided with greater understanding that noble wines require noble terroirs, and that technology can’t compensate for a mediocre site.

Great terroir and dedication to minimalist traditional methods are what the Vatan domaine has in spades. The Loire’s longest-lived, most complex Sancerres come from the famed terres blanches soils in the neighboring villages of Chavignol, Amigny and Verdigny.

This “white earth” is the southwestern-most extension of the same vein of Kimmeridgian rock that gives great Chablis its hallmark minerality and nerve. What makes Chavignol’s Les Monts Damnésrise above all other Sancerre lieux-dits is its ideal south-through-southeast exposure and its nearly vertically-steep slope of pure terres blanches that gives the site its “damned mountain” name.

And the Vatan monopole of Clos la Néore is arguably Monts Damnés’ finest parcel, located in the sheltered heart of the slope. Thirteen generations of Vatan have tended vines here, dating back to when the family purchased the land in 1789.

"Clarity is a term that accurately describes the 2018 Sancerre Clos La Néore. It has a pure and intense core of fruit. But it's not fruity. It's a sophisticated style with a distinctive aromatic profile - chamomile tea, lemon, honey and almond meal and an almost tonic-like edge. While showing the ripeness of the 2018 season, it retains its shape with a corset of acidity and phenolics that guide the wine on and on." Vinous 96