Domaine Hubert Brochard produces classically styled Sancerre blanc, rosé, and rouge from their family-owned winery in Chavignol. Aimée Brochard inherited her father’s vines in the early 1900s, growing grapes and raising goats to produce cheese with the help of her husband Hubert. The domaine is now run by the fifth and sixth generation of Brochards with 152 acres under vine in Sancerre, Pouilly-Fumé, and Vin de Pays du Val de Loire. Today, brothers Daniel, Jean-François, and Benoît Brochard run the domaine with the help of Daniel’s daughters, Caroline and Anne-Sophie, and produce wines that express their region’s terroir.
Location of Vineyard
The domaine is composed of 113 acres of Sauvignon Blanc and 39 acres of Pinot Noir spread across the communes of Chavignol, Sancerre, Sainte-Gemme, Ménétréol, Saint-Satur, Thauvenay, and Bannay with additional vineyards in Pouilly-Fumé. These diverse holdings give the Brochard’s a range of soils from which to build wines of depth and complexity. The family holds parcels in Les Monts Damnés and the Côte de Beaujeu, two of Chavignol’s most famous vineyards, where terres blanches soils of Kimmeridgian marl give powerful wines. Silex, or flint, is concentrated around Sancerre, St-Satur, Ménétréol, and Thauvenay, and yields wines with a strong mineral character. Finally, vineyards planted on chalky caillottes soil bring attractive aromas to the wines.
Winemaking Philosophy
Domaine Hubert Brochard is one of only a small number of Sancerre producers who continue to harvest most of their grapes by hand. The Sauvignon Blanc special cuvées, single-vineyards, and all the Pinot Noir are manually harvested and transported to the winery in small crates. Sauvignon Blanc is destemmed and pressed pneumatically before vinification in stainless-steel tanks. Sancerre Aujourd'hui Comme Autrefois, Le Cul du Beaujeu, and Côte des Monts Damnés spend an additional period on the fine lees before bottling. Pinot Noir is destemmed and receives a brief cold maceration before fermentation in stainless-steel tanks. The wine is aged for one year in used French oak barrels before bottling.
