Tete En L’air Chardonnay, Maison Ventenac

Translated, the name of this wine is ‘Head in the clouds’.

This is a natural Chardonnay from the south-west of France, created to showcase this grape in its truest form. With no chemical intervention in the vineyard or winery, this wine has also not seen any oak (a happy ‘airhead’ mistake!) meaning the flavour expresses Chardonnay in its truest, unaltered form. (Husband and wife team Oliver and Stephanie Rame “forgot” to age their chardonnay in oak – and the result – a fantastic, rich, creamy white).

A cracking un-oaked Chardonnay, with zingy minerality and focus, backed by an aromatic complexity of exotic fruits, honey and subtle toast notes. A balanced structure on the palate both lively, rich, with a silky texture and a rounded mouthfeel. You’ll be treated to beaming citrus, cream and mango notes. A precise, fresh and rich wine.

The producer:

Maison Ventenac is run by husband and wife team Stephanie and Olivier Rame in the Languedoc-Roussillon, using natural winemaking practices.

Stephanie & Olivier Rame, wife and husband, are the third generation of their family at Maison Ventenac. Their vineyards are in Cabardès, the only Languedoc appellation that allows Atlantic and Mediterranean grape varieties, offering a unique exploration of flavours. Their location around Ventenac-Cabardès is famed for limestone, chalky soils, which gives their wines saline and fresh characters. Olivier’s philosophy is to allow the unique terroir to shine through in the wines, presenting them as naturally as possible and raising in terra cotta urns and concrete vats to enhance their purity. The village of Ventenac-Cabardès and the surrounding region are famed for the distinctive nature of the limestone vein running through them. The vines – planted on hillsides around Maison Ventenac – benefit fully from this special soil structure, formed 50 million years ago when the area was still beneath the Mediterranean. This gives these wines their mineral, saline and fresh character.