 Oh, body, right, savory, wrong, rich, spicy red wines. That's what you find in Chat Noctubob. Learn more about the wines and the latest vintages in this video. Welcome back to Exotic Wine Travel. I am your host, Matthew Orkey. Hi, I'm Sherin Taw. Well, come back to the show. We're still locked down in Zagreb. If you've been following us, you'll notice I have a haircut. So finally, after 100 days, my hair was getting a little bit out of control. But everybody's commenting on our social media. They're like me with the old longer hair, so. You just have to grow it out again. Yeah, you have to grow it back out again. So welcome back to the show. We're going to talk today about Chat Noctubob. For those of you who don't know, Chat Noctubob is one of the most, is probably the most famous village in the southern throne in the south of France known for big, rich red wines. It was actually one of, and possibly the first appellation in France with the AOC rules. Back in 1923, started out with 10 permitted grapes. Moved to 13, and I think in 1936. And in 2009, went to 18 permitted grape varieties. Pretty cool. You can blend all the grapes, even white grapes with red grapes. Or you can make 100% of a specific variety, which you find kind of cool. Which is typically ganache. Yeah. The reds of Chat Noctubob are based on our GSM blends, based on ganache, syrup, mervedrille, liqueurines of the higher quality. Ones are mostly 100% ganache or mostly ganache. There's a small percentage, maybe 6% of whites made. Usually see rouson, rouson, ganache blanc, claret, bourbon legs, some other white grapes are permitted in the whites as well. Last year in 2019, we visited the region, tasted through hundreds and hundreds of 2015, 16 reds, 17s, even 18s for the whites. Unfortunately, because the whole situation going on in the world this year, we weren't able to attend. So several producers actually sent us some wines to review. But there's nothing like being there, right? Yeah, you got a full experience on that there. But that's it. Been here tasting the wines at home. It gives us a full spectrum of experiencing the entire bottle, seeing how to do pairing. And we have a lot of time to discuss about what we like and dislike about the wines and the entire appellations. Yeah. But I'd rather be there. Definitely. Last year when we were there, besides the wines, I think Shereen was most excited about the cheese because we're so close to the house, right? Access to a lot of great cheese. Chat Noctubob is a region that holds a special place in my heart. Not Shereen wine. You know, when I was a wine enthusiast but didn't really know that much about wine, I would always tell people that I like Cote d'Orone because it wasn't really that popular of an area compared to Bordeaux, Burgundy, that kind of stuff. Wines are inexpensive. They're usually good. Chat Noctubob is actually a crew of the bigger Cote d'Orone appellation. And I remember one of my friends, she was a more experienced wine geek, got me a special gift. It was a clothe of pop, Chat Noctubob 2003. And I remember looking at the label and they're not seeing Cote d'Orone on it, they were seeing like this Chat Noctubob with this like fancy emblem. And I was like, this isn't Cote d'Orone. I remember you had that wine when it was about 10 years old, more than 10 years old. Yeah, that's so. Perfect evolution. But I really liked the wine. Shereen, not always the case. Yeah, so for me in general, I've tasted like quite a couple of Chat Noctubob. And even prior to the trip last year, I didn't really, I wasn't that fond of Chat Noctubob for several reasons. I find that most of them, even the clothe of pop that we had, was a little bit like too ripe, one-dimensional, maybe very savory, kind of lacking the certain liveliness or edge to it. It was a very good wine, but it just wasn't particularly memorable for me. And getting to drink a little bit more Chat Noctubob, especially the younger ones, I realized that they were just way too ripe and too alcoholic for me, among the few that I tried. Luckily, the last couple of vintages as I've gotten Shereen to change her heart a little bit, change her opinion. For those that you don't know, 15, 16, 16 especially, especially where a legendary vintages in Chat Noctubob, I personally like the 16s a lot. I think they're a little bit brighter, have a little more Sydney. I think you definitely like 15 because a little bit darker than more Tannin, right? I like 15 for, yeah, because like you said, it's got more Tannins, but I think 16 has been really consistent. Even from smaller producers that we don't typically love, they make really great wines in 16. So I have to say that the consistency, the freshness is definitely there. In 16 you're talking about. But you like 15. Don't you prefer 15 a little bit more? I can't say that. I think I enjoy both vintages for various reasons. So 2017 actually and 18 especially are vintages where they had some producers had a little bit of problems with Grenache and they used some darker grapes like Mervejo's Cira. Wines tend to be darker, a little more Tannic, a little more robust, kind of outlined me in the 2015 sign. I mean, we didn't taste, last year we got, we tasted hundreds of examples from every vintage. This year, you know, we got about maybe 50 to 60 samples, but we got an overall good impression. What was your impression overall to 2017? And even 18 for red. I think it's quite close to 15, like you said. It's more robust, but at the same time, I think it's still a little bit more dialback in terms of Tannins based on the examples that we tasted. I would say that it's kind of like, 17 is kind of between like 15 and 2006, 10. And it's definitely very approachable. You can't say it's very approachable, right? But it's drinkable right now when at this age. It probably needs a few more years of evolution, but a lot of them that we tasted, they are ready to drink now. And that's the beauty, I think, of Depop. It's a fine wine region that the wines are really accessible early. That was one of the reasons why it turned me around to like shut down Depop for that reason. So why these, so lately, we've been convincing and sharing last night. Finally, we were drinking, I think the Chate Cigali right here. Shutting off Depop 2017. And she said, finally, she's like, if you drink, she's like, okay, I like Shutting off Depop. Can you explain why? I think the whole idea of whether you like a region or not has to depend on like percentages of the number of wines that you really enjoy. And as I taste more, I do realize that you can in fact find wines that are, when alcohol is not really dialback because it's still 15%, sometimes even 16%, but it doesn't sticks out, like it's very integrated. And I really appreciate the fact that there are different kinds of Shutting off Depop. Like there are some that's more animal, more savory, there are some that's more grapefruit-driven. And then because you have eight and different grapes that you can blend so every single producer can have their very own kind of signature blend or produce very different sort of wine. So I really appreciate the variation. I think it's also not just me understanding the appellation better. I do think that certain producers are known to also create fresher styles this is, you know, creating more finesse and elegance. And that's what I typically sick for in a wine. So I'm really happy to see that there are less of those like overripe, like, you know, very jammy sort of Shutting off Depop where on the palate it's just flat on the palate. You do get something like, I really like the Cigale because it was Shante Cigale because it was very savory and it's got 10 in, man. I love 10 in, by the way. So anyways, I think you hit it in the head. There's a lot of diversity in style. These are big red wines. I mean, you want to have these with lamb, lamb leg, steak, really, really robust flavors. Let's talk about, you know, we didn't taste through all of the wines yet, but we tasted through most of them. So what are kind of, here are some of our favorites. You want to talk about some of the stylistic differences that we have here. I'm about to add on to you, right? And the amazing thing about Shutting off Depop is it goes well with, you know, rich dishes, but at the same time, there are a lot of wines that you can consume on its own because it's just made to, like, so round and so palatable that I usually drink a lot of wines before, you know that already, but Shutting off Depop is one of the few areas where I can drink the wine on its own. Over here, we have a whole range of predominantly GSMs. So Dinaj, Sarah, I'm there. This, we visited this producer. Bordeaux Borsons. Bordeaux Borsons. Go ahead, yeah. Really old-school, a little bit lower in alcohol, more leathery, more savory. Mm. Exactly. So they do, they do quite a lot of whole bunch of fermentation. So you would expect something a little bit more structured, but also with the whole bunch of fermentation, I think that it does bring a little bit more finesse and ageability in the wine as well. So that one is, I would say, classic flavor profile, but with a certain, like, structure and finesse that's a little bit hard to find these days. And this is another, oh, I love this. Hello. Dominique, hello. Yeah. Andre Brunel. So I remember arriving in Château du Pât last year and this was the first producer that got my attention because everything that I tasted from them was excellent, the red, the white, everything. This is just classic, stewed strawberries, minerals, rocks. Ah, mineral. Oh, leather, it's really good stuff. Talked about the Chante Cigali already. Uh-huh. And that, this has finesse. This is definitely a wine with finesse. These two really blew me away because they are GSM as well, but the colors are lighter. It's not as, because when you look at GSM, right, the Château du Pât, usually it's a little bit more blue-tinted or purple, but these two are towards more, like, garnet red. And body's lighter, more really medium-body, much more elegant, and towards a fresher, grapefruit style. And if you want, you mentioned that this is, like, kind of like a Burgundian style for you. This is Ex-Second Burgundian. This was made by a cooperative, ridiculously priced, you can get, you know, 20 euros for this wine. I think it's a tremendous value. Yeah, these two really break the more Château du Pât for us. For you, you like this, it's a Grenache and Cinso, right? So the Cinso was dried. So it creates a, it has this amazing spice box, nose to it, and even though you have this ripeness, it's just like right at the brim of jaminess because of the Cinso, but it provided so much flavors to the wine. Yet, again, there's two freshness in the wine. We have wines like this, the Gérot Grenache de Père, and the Grand Tunel Alexis Establet. 100% Grenache, these are really stellar wines. Charingne especially loved this one. I really like the Gérot. I love the contrast of the richness, but yet, at the same time, they're again, like, I always seek for this freshness in the wine despite how rich or extracted it is. And this gives it, man, all. We have the Gérot Dine, the Pure Blue. This is made without sulfite, with no sulfites added. Pumped with CO2 to kind of preserve the wine. You have to shake it out. I thought this was interesting. You loved it, quite floral, right? I love that. I thought it was quite coat roti on the nose. I hope that's not offensive, but I really thought it has got this amazing florality to the nose. And then we have finally, we have the classic, the Main Du Paggale, Chat Nof de Pap 2017. This is classic for a lot of producers. This is meaty, horsetail, leathery. Not everyone's, a little more than I taste, not to yours as much. But yeah, I mean, I'm glad that you came around. I think these wines are nice approachable. They're delicious. You know, some of the bad things are obviously, some producers, a lot of producers have problems with alcohol, the alcohol start to climb. They get really, really big, sometimes 15, 5, 16% alcohol. Of course, these wines are not cheap. They're some of the more expensive in the Southern Rome, but you know, I guess that's what you have to deal with, right? To your point also, right? Even though you say 15, 16% alcohol, don't be frightened by the alcohol level, because I think often it's all about integration. And when you have, when it's balanced, when there's lots of fruit, a lot of complexity, you really don't taste the alcohol. Well, you may feel it, like, you know, tomorrow or at the end of the night, but at least you won't taste that. So, yeah, stay tuned to our channel for more. We have a couple videos on Chat Nof de Pap. We have an upcoming big report on our website, ExactlyWineTravel.com. I will put that in the description box. So, anything else you wanna add on that? What are we drinking tonight? We'll find something. So guys, if you like this video, please subscribe to our YouTube channel. ExactlyWineTravel. I will see you at our next episode. Good job.