Wild Country: 2016 Château Sainte Eulalie Plaisir d’Eulalie Minervois
Posted on: 04/20/18 3:22 PM
Wild flowers, berries, dark and savory, velvety fruit with a hint of bitter dark chocolate … the 2016 Château Sainte Eulalie is the perfect example of how Minervois is beating the Cote du Rhône at their own game. Bright acidity, sweet, lushly textured fruit and an unmistakable Languedoc garrigue wildness, the Château Sainte Eulalie bursts alive with vibrancy and sheer gluggable delight. A majority Syrah blend with old vine (nearly 100 years) Carignan and just a wee drop of Grenache (75 year old), this is an instant classic for daily drinkers. Make no mistake: Château Sainte Eulalie is a beautifully crafted, stunning value for a juicy, silky everyday red.
2016 Château Sainte Eulalie Plaisir d’Eulalie Minervois
More about the Wine:
Sainte Eulalie is located on the terraced hills in an extremely exciting and ambitious appellation within the Minervois, La Livinière. Loaded with a buffet table assortment of limestone terroir (limey clays, soft limey marls, calcareous sandstones and stony limestone pebbles), the wines born here enjoy a well-established reputation in France for silky, fruit driven texture, and brightly focused acidity. During this continuing renaissance for the Minervois, and the Languedoc as a whole, La Livinière is jockeying (and in many ways winning) to be considered top dog, locked in a competitive race with rival (and extremely heralded appellation) Terrasses du Larzac. One of the key domains keeping the flag high for La Livinière is Château Sainte Eulalie.
Established in 1996, husband and wife team Laurent and Isabelle Coustal arrived from Bordeaux in search for a winery. This isn’t unique. This prestigious terroir has attracted many Bordelais to set up shop here, including the Cazes family of Lynch-Bages fame, who chose La Livinière as the place where it wanted to make Languedoc wine (L’Ostal Cazes). The Coustal’s resurrected and restored ancient Minervois vineyards surrounding their new domain. Twelve years in, the domain is rightfully considered a standard-bearer for the region.
The quality of Coustal’s Plaisir d’Eulalie is superb. 100% hand-picked organic fruit (highly unusual for a $12 bottle), the majority picked from old vines averaging over sixty years old (also highly unusual for $12 bottle), you will be hard pressed to find a nightly red this serious and tasty.
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