Being on the border of the Moulin-à-Vent cru, the core of Roilette’s Fleurie terroir is atypical of Fleurie, rich in clay and the mineral manganese instead of being all granite; the wines are thus more structured than many Fleurie wines. The oldest estate vines, at around 80 years old, go into the Cuvée Tardive bottling. It is the concentration and structure of the wine that gave rise to its “Tardive” or “late” moniker: it is not late-harvested fruit but rather wine meant to be enjoyed later, with longer aging in bottle.
As on the rest of the estate, the Tardive vines are farmed sustainably by lutte raisonnée and the soils worked by hand, only twice a year and very carefully in order to not do damage to roots of these old vines. The fruit is manually harvested and fermented in whole clusters with native yeasts in open-top, neutral wood vats with the cap kept submerged; the maceration for Tardive is approximately 18 days. Aging takes place in old foudres until bottling the following summer.
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