Didier Dagueneau Jurançon Les Jardins de Babylone Museum Release 500ml 2008

Les Jardins de Babylone is the Jurançon that Didier Dagueneau took on in 2002, three hectares of terraces on the slopes of Aubertin in the foothills of the Pyrenees.

Jurançon lies in the far south-west of France, near Pau, and its sweet wines are made not from botrytis but from passerillage — grapes left on the vine into late autumn until they shrivel and concentrate in the dry warm winds off the mountains. Petit Manseng is the variety that makes this possible, with thick skins and ferocious natural acidity that keeps the finished wine taut rather than cloying. Dagueneau, by then established in Pouilly-Fumé, had wanted to make a sweet wine and found the land here undervalued; the terraces climb in an amphitheatre facing the mountains, which is where the name comes from. The soils are clay and rolled pebbles, the picking is by hand, the wine ferments in wood, and it is never chaptalised. The 500ml bottle is the cuvée's standard format.

Already complex and capable of decades in bottle. Serve at 8–10°C with Roquefort, a tarte tatin or foie gras.

*Every effort is made to ensure the current vintage is accurate; however, variations can occur. If you are after a specific vintage, please contact us prior to ordering.