Grape Guide
Pineau D'aunis
RedPineau d'Aunis is an old black-skinned Loire variety, now rare, that gives pale, high-acid, peppery reds, dry to off-dry rosés and sparkling base wine. It is the lead grape of Coteaux du Loir and Coteaux du Vendômois and a minor partner in several Touraine and Anjou blends.
Key Characteristics
- Black-skinned Loire variety, unrelated to Pinot Noir or Chenin Blanc despite the old name Chenin Noir
- Mid-ripening with irregular yields; quality drops sharply when crops are not restrained
- Tight bunches of small berries that are prone to botrytis; leaves brown and fruit sunburns easily
- Low pigment and phenolic content, so colour and structure are often built by bleeding or blending
- French plantings fell from 1,741 ha in 1958 to 435 ha in 2009, with recent estimates near 500 ha
Typical Flavors
Major Regions
Touraine · Coteaux du Loir · Coteaux du Vendômois · Anjou (reds and rosés) · Valençay · Crémant de Loire
Also Known As
Chenin Noir (Loire · California) · Plant d'Aunis (Maine-et-Loire · Loir-et-Cher) · Aunis (Loir-et-Cher) · Gros Pineau · Gros Véronais (Loire) · Plant de Mayet (Sarthe) · Mançais Noir (Loir valley)
Overview
Pineau d'Aunis is a black-skinned grape of the middle Loire that produces light, aromatic wine with a clear peppery edge. Reds are pale to medium in colour, high in acidity and light in tannin, with red-berry fruit and a white and black pepper lift of the kind associated with Syrah. It is also made as dry and off-dry rosé, as vin gris and as a base for sparkling wine. Its range is narrow and its volume small. The best-known versions come from the Loir and Vendômois valleys and from Touraine, where small growers have revived it as a varietal wine after decades in which it was regarded mostly as a blending partner. Yield and ripeness matter more here than with most varieties: crops left unchecked give thin, vegetal wine, while restrained vines in a warm year give a fragrant, firmly structured red.
Origins & History
The word Pineau was in use in the Loire by 1183, but it was attached to at least four different grapes, among them Chenin Blanc and Pinot Noir, so medieval mentions cannot safely be assigned to this variety. The first dependable record is an 1816 list of the vines grown around Loches, in Touraine. Stories of thirteenth-century exports to England and of fifteenth-century gifts of vines to dukes have been dismissed by a historian of Loire viticulture as legends that hardened into fact through repetition. The Coteaux du Loir appellation's own account credits monks of a priory at Marçon, in the Sarthe, with planting it near Chahaignes under local names such as Plant de Mayet and Mançais Noir, but this rests on oral tradition, which dates the first local vine planting to the sixth century. The name combines pin, French for pine, since the bunches resemble pine cones, with Aunis, a coastal territory around La Rochelle, although the variety is now grown almost entirely in the Loire basin. By 1845 an ampelographer was calling it Chenin Noir, which encouraged the idea that Chenin Blanc was its white mutation. DNA profiling disproved this: Pineau d'Aunis is unrelated to Chenin Blanc and to Pinot Noir. Its own parentage is unresolved, and it has been placed in the Messile ampelographic group. Vines once stood throughout Touraine, Indre, Vienne, Loiret, the Sarthe and Maine-et-Loire. Phylloxera and later replanting to more productive or more fashionable varieties cut French plantings from 1,741 ha in 1958 to 435 ha in 2009, and recent estimates still sit near 500 ha. The name Chenin Noir also survived in California.
Viticultural Characteristics
Pineau d'Aunis is mid-ripening, bursting into growth after Chardonnay, Gamay and Pinot Noir but before Cabernet Franc. Its tight clusters of small berries invite botrytis in wet autumns, and the leaves are prone to browning and the fruit to sunburn in hot, dry spells. The variety is susceptible to chlorosis and gives irregular yields, so crop control is the main quality lever. Clones 235 and 289 are widely propagated, and SO4 rootstock, common since the 1960s, is increasingly replaced by Riparia Gloire de Montpellier. The skins carry little colour, which makes extraction a concern in the cellar as well as in the vineyard.
Wine Styles & Characteristics
Red is the benchmark style: pale ruby, light to medium in body, high in acidity and modest in tannin, with red cherry, raspberry and wild strawberry fruit and distinct white and black pepper. Rotundone, the compound behind pepper in Syrah, has been found in the variety at more than twice its odour threshold, which accounts for the aroma. Because pigment and phenolics are low, growers often bleed off juice or blend with Cabernet Franc to build colour and structure, and fermentation near 20 °C helps avoid cooked fruit. Rosé is an established style, ranging from dry to lightly sweet, and the Coteaux du Vendômois makes a vin gris from the variety alone. It also serves as a component in sparkling Crémant de Loire and in the fizz of Touraine and Anjou.