Feely Sincérité Sauvignon blanc – A Taste of the Sea

In this post Caro Feely explains Feely Sincérité Sauvignon blanc

• A very limited edition and why we need your support
• A story of the sea – the terroir – limestone or ancient compressed seabed – the source of the minerality you find in all Feely wines
• Potential Pairings for Feely Sincérité
• The origin of the name Sincérité
• New approach to less waste and more sustainability
• Handmade and hand labelled with love
• Speaking of Stories of the Sea – Aoife’s Maritime Radio podcast

Feely Sincérité 2024 – a Very Limited edition

Feely Sincérité Sauvignon blanc 2024 is a very limited edition of 639 bottles.

Why? Because in May 2024 were were struck by a terrible hailstorm. It broke windows, left the vehicles looking like they had been hammered by a crazy giant and shredded the vines, breaking off most of the flowers that would have become grapes. We lost 90% overall and some sections lost 100%.

The Sauvignon blanc closest to the village was less affected  – what became this wine. It is a small miracle that we have anything available given the scale of the devastation. 

There will be zero vintage 2024 Feely red wines – but since our red wines are released in a more staggered fashion we still have new reds being released now  – Feely La Source 2021- a lush natural wine Merlot Cabernet Sauvignon barrel aged blend and Feely Verite 2021 a spicy barrel aged Cab Sauv  – joining the almost sold out Feely La Source 2020 and Feely Vérité 2019. 

To weather this economic storm (‘scuse the pun) – we need your help! – please buy direct from us – (and why not join the wine club for great advantages) and please share the details of our wines with your friends – we need to sell all this wine direct (selling at trade prices is not an option given the cost of production as a result of the storm).

Buy Feely Sincerite Sauvignon blanc 2024 or buy a mixed case that includes this lovely wine. 

Sincérité a Story of the Sea

Feely Sincerite tells a story of the sea – of the ancient compressed seabed and sea fossils that forms the base and first pillar of the terroir of Chateau Feely wines. It is like sincerity: straight-talking, linear, direct, with a depth of flavour and a truth to its terroir and an overlay of a sea breeze and minerality from the limestone it grows in.

Buy Feely Sincerite Sauvignon blanc  or buy a mixed case that includes this lovely wine. 

Are you skeptical about minerality like Dave was in Caro Feely’s second book of the Vineyard Series Saving our Skins? (extract below)

‘I thought all that guff about minerality was a load of bollocks,’ said Dave.
‘It’s totally for real!’ said Caro. ‘Claude Bourguignon, one of the top soil scientists in France shows that at one and two metres below the earth’s surface are critters that eat rocks for a living. They excrete the rocks as soluble minerals, making them available to plants. I knew I tasted minerality in our wines but with all the naysayers… ’ – Caro looked meaningfully at Dave. The death of the critters was also one of the reasons industrial food has become poorer in fundamental minerals. ‘Bourguignon says doing what the critters do for free in a healthy soil would take several hundred man-hours of work per acre per year.’ 

The taste of place – minerality, seabreeze and hint of saltiness – in Feely Sincerite is thanks to the sea fossils and the ancient seabed that the vines grow in and the critters (bacteria, fungi and insects) that release that minerality in a form that can be taken up by our vines.

Photo below Feely Sincérité alongside a limestone rock showing many shell fossils

Potential Pairings for Feely Sincérité Sauvignon blanc

Feely Sincerite Sauvignon blanc pairs beautifully with a lemon, pea and mint risotto, with a simple Spinach cream Pasta,  with oysters, seafood, fish, asparagus and many other fresh summer foods. 

Buy Feely Sincerite -a pure, mineral Sauvignon blanc or buy a mixed case that includes this lovely wine. 

What’s in a Name? Sancerre – Sincere – Sincérité

Feely Sincerite Sauvignon blanc is a pure sauvignon blanc originally named ‘sincere’ as a play on words with Sancerre due to the minerality and the pure Sauvignon blanc character. It is a wine that is direct and bright with a purity and freshness that is like sincerity. Find out about the origins of all the names of Feely wines. 

New approach to less waste & more sustainability

This latest vintage of Feely Sincerite generates less waste.

• As with the last few vintages – Feely Sincerite is bottled in an Ecova light bottle that weighs 395g decreasing significantly the CO2 emissions for the glass compared to traditional bottles that weigh in at over 500g (please recycle the glass bottles after enjoying the wine).
• No filtration – we love it as it is and didn’t want to strip any flavour so we didn’t filter or fine it. This means it may throw a small deposit (delicious to drink – don’t skip the last drops in the bottle)
• No capsule (the silver foil that goes over the top of the bottle). The capsule serves no purpose and generates unnecessary waste- the customs used to require it to show the customs paid but you can get agreement to have no capsule which we have done

Do you have any other ideas for us? Find out more about what we do to make Chateau Feely as eco-friendly as possible. We are always looking for suggestions and ways to improve.

Handmade and hand labelled with love

As with all our wines Feely Sincerite was hand picked and hand made with love but also hand labelled 🙂

The full service truck we usually book for our bottling is a day fee of around 6000 euro regardless of the number of bottles and we use it for the full day. This was not an option for 637 bottles of Sincerite so we booked a tiré bouché bottling plant (without labelling) for a tenth of the price but that meant labelling by hand.

And look who dropped in for a visit and landed up helping Caro to do the hand labelling 🙂  – the amazing Cecile – who some of you have met through Caro’s third book in the vineyard series ‘Vineyard Confessions’ or back in Harvest 2015 or 2016. She is back living locally and we are delighted – more on that in an upcoming newsletter.

Speaking of Stories of the Sea

You may have met lovely Aoife McKiernan on Harvest day 2022 or 2023. She left an imprint on us and Chateau Feely guests and visitors with her great sense of humour and fun, and a story telling night we’ll never forget.

Aoife went on to win a year scholarship as a Diving Ambassador for Rolex. In the process of following her passion for scuba diving and the sea she started a podcast – Maritime Radio is a collection of stories from the sea. Episodes feature personal essays, interviews, and conversations with people who live and work by the water. 

We’ll be catching up with more old friends ‘alumni’ of Chateau Feely – in future emails so sign up to our newsletter at the bottom right of this page.

Photo below Aoife, Sean and Caro in 2023

Buy Feely Sincerite Sauvignon blanc or a mixed case that includes this lovely wine. 

For a 360 experience order the books and the wine and then close the circle by staying at Chateau Feely or visiting us to experience the vineyard in person. For a fully immersive experience we recommend the five day wine tour or five day walking touror for a relaxing experience the two day yoga retreat.