Softness, between resistance and extinction
With three main production areas: the South-West, Anjou and Alsace, some thirty appellations, and volumes that vary from vintage to vintage, the market for sweet and syrupy wines is experiencing varying fortunes in the face of changing consumer trends.
" No thanks, I don't like sweet wines. "Who hasn't heard this refrain in front of a golden bottle of sauternes or a coteaux-du-layon? Try an experiment: feign prejudice with a côtes-de-bordeaux-saint-macaire, a pacherenc-du-vic-bilh from the Pyrenees or a bonnezeaux from angevin, sweet wines that everyone has forgotten. Tasting often changes one's mind, not least because the high acidity offsets the dreaded sweetness.
Aromatic delight
Sweet wines, a heterogeneous production, have in common a residual sugar content - after fermentation - of over 12 grams per liter. Below 45 grams, they are said to be "semi-sweet", and sweet beyond that. The term "liquoreux" has no regulatory definition: it is used to designate the richest nectars, up to 250 grams per liter for certain Alsatian lords. These autumn "jams" conceal an intense aromatic voluptuousness, sculpted in a sheath of acidity. Moelleux" wines are softer, with fresh fruit and liveliness. Sweet wines are made from grapes harvested when slightly overripe or more pronounced - known as passerillage or vendanges tardives.they are often picked in several "passages" to select berries at different stages of dehydration, and therefore concentration. this is sometimes compounded by the presence of a noble fungus, Botrytis cinerea - in Sauternes, Quart-de-Chaume or in Alsace for the selection of noble grapes...
Monbazillac, the champion
South of Bergerac, the Monbazillac appellation covers 2,300 hectares and produces 7.5 million bottles (60,000 hectolitres) of this rich, golden-coloured wine, with aromas of candied fruit and gingerbread.sold 70% in supermarkets, it is the "popular" counterpart to the elitist Sauternes from Bordeaux." We're pulling up red wine vines all around us, but not the Semillon and Muscadelle varieties we use to make Monbazillac," says Annette Goulard, vice-president of the cooperative. The winegrowers manage their stocks by collectively setting a maximum yield each year: " In this way, we maintain a decent income at 3,500 euros per 900 liters, even if we'd always like a little more. "Sauternes had to grub up its vines, reducing them from 2,200 to 1,600 hectares ten years ago.
" Stock levels are at their lowest for twenty-five years. Our market is very small, but healthy," assures Jean-Jacques Dubourdieu of Château Doisy-Daëne, president of the Sauternes-Barsac appellation. There are 140 growers on the banks of the Ciron, a river whose mists provide the humidity needed for botrytis to develop on the skin of the Semillon grape. The limited yield of 25 hl/ha produces three to four million bottles, rich in a palette of fifty aromas. And an infinite range of hues, from light gold to amber to scarlet copper, depending on age. A great wine for laying down, almost eternal, it is the king of sweet wines. Forget Grandpa's pairing with foie gras and black forest, it's with Sunday roast chicken, fine fish, blue-veined cheese, tangy desserts or spicy dishes that it will reveal all its majesty.
To restore its tarnished reputation, Sauternes wants to be modern and appeal to younger consumers by slipping into their cocktails. Sweet wines account for 3% of Bordeaux's surface area. In addition to Sauternes and Barsac, the Entre-deux-Mers region produces generic sweet Bordeaux and a few sweet nuggets such as Sainte-Croix-du-Mont (200 ha), Loupiac (150 ha), Cadillac (80 ha) and Côtes-de-Bordeaux-Saint-Macaire (just 18 ha!). These appellations are threatened by the age of the winegrowers, who are nearing retirement and often have no successors. But even though they're on borrowed time, all these appellations are defending their turf, " which doesn't make sense when it comes to exports", saysEmma Baudry, head of the Union des vins doux de Bordeaux, who regrets that Sweet Bordeaux, a common brand created in 2009, has fallen into disuse. "Producers are increasingly turning to Crémant," she observes. "It's our main competitor", adds Annette Goulard, for Monbazillac: " Sweet and sparkling wines have the same consumption times: end-of-year celebrations, weddings, birthdays...".
Resistance from Pau
South of Pau, in Jurançon, wines based on petit and gros manseng, whose natural acidity whips sugar, are more than holding their own: releases of moelleux increased by 3% between 2014 and 2023, even if the expansion of this very dynamic vineyard (from 600 to 1,400 hectares in twenty-five years) has mainly benefited the development of dry white wines.
