Cahor's On The Up

The home of malbec is being transformed as the robust ‘black wines’ are given a more refined edge

 

Some sites seem so well suited to viticulture, it is as if God himself had planted vines there. It was this thought that sprang to mind as I stood on the remote sun-baked plateau that surrounds Château de Haute-Serre, in the far south-east of the Cahors appellation. As far from the banks of the River Lot as it is possible to be in Cahors, at an altitude of 300 metres, these vineyards are also its highest, strewn with limestone boulders, through which the indigenous malbec vines push skyward.

In the Middle Ages, the heyday of the Cahors vineyards, the château was owned by the Abbey of Lagarde Dieu, which farmed 1,000 hectares of vineyards. Today, 60 hectares of mostly malbec vines are planted on the best sites, around which saffron crocuses grow in winter. A thousand oak trees have been planted to encourage the growth of the black truffles for which the nearby village of Lalbenque is renowned. The château itself is built from local limestone: elegant in its solidity and beautifully restored; this is the residence of vignerons Bertrand and Christine Vigouroux.

In 2008, the family opened a ‘bistronomique’ restaurant, La Table de Haute-Serre, within the cellar, and this year it earned the Michelin Guide’s Bib Gourmand for good-value fine dining. It was here that I met Bertrand to learn more about the estate. “Haute-Serre always makes the silkiest of wines,” he explained, noting my appreciation for the deeply coloured red that filled my glass. “It’s the complex clay limestone soils combined with the altitude that give the wines their elegance.”