2020 Domaine Huet Le Haut Lieu Premiere Trie Vouvray Moelleux Loire Valley 750 ml

Yquem. Climens. Suduiraut. The names of the great sweet wines of France are well known, and they roll off the tongue as effortlessly as the wines glide across the palate. 

We don’t hesitate to Domaine Huet’s Premiere Trie wines in that pantheon. No Loire winery does dessert wine (or any white wine, for that matter) better than Huet, and these bottles—made from selected passes of lusciously ripe and often botrytized grapes—stand with the icons of Sauternes. They also happen to represent some of the greatest deals in the world of sweet wine.

Showing a brilliant balance between sweet fruit and zesty, nearly salty acidity, the 2020 Le Haut Lieu Premiere Trie Moelleux brilliantly conveys the exceptional nature of Loire Chenin Blanc. It also shows why Huet’s historic estate has, since its founding in 1928, become the gold standard of Chenin Blanc in the Loire Valley—“justly regarded as the leading property in the Vouvray region,” according to the late, great Master of Wine Clive Coates. 

Domaine Huet’s iconic estate’s three parcels—Le Haut-Lieu, Le Mont, and Clos du Bourg—compose most of Vouvray’s première côte. They were an early adopter of biodynamic farming and stand as a model for small producers around the world.

Le Haut Lieu is Huet’s original vineyard, lying slightly higher and further from the Loire than the other two parcels, and produces the most open and accessible of their wines, with broad richness and a tropical-inflected palate. Even though this is structured to age for multiple decades, it’s definitely the most approachable now—an exceptional pairing with beautifully ripe cheeses or as its own after-dinner treat.