Touraine Oisly
It was in 2011 that the two youngest of Touraine’s geographical denominations were created, the modern-day David and Goliath of the Touraine appellation. Here Goliath is played by Touraine Chenonceaux, an expansive vineyard which snakes its way along the clay and limestone slopes that follow the Cher, and it is described in detail in my guide to Touraine Chenonceaux. Playing the role of David, meanwhile, is the rather more diminutive Touraine Oisly.
Touraine Oisly will, I suspect, always languish in the shadow of the more significant Touraine Chenonceaux. It is a considerably smaller zone, a pocket of vineyards set adrift somewhere on the sandy sea of the Sologne, the triangle of land which separates the Loire from the Cher with gradually reducing enthusiasm, until it finally gives up in the suburbs of Tours and the two rivers become one. At the moment of the denomination’s inception back in 2011 fewer than a dozen domaines rose to the challenge, producing a tiny volume of wine. And while it has grown a little since then, the words to focus on in these two sentences are tiny and little.
The Touraine Oisly zone also feels rather less tangible than its grander neighbour. While anybody can draw their finger down the course of the Cher on a map, thereby outlining the Touraine Chenonceaux appellation with the confidence of a Ligérian wine savant, to do the same with Touraine Oisly requires more detailed knowledge. It has no grand river to which we can point as its home and, unlike Touraine Amboise and Touraine Chenonceaux, it has no town or grand château of international renown to act as a motif or focal point for the region and its vines. What Touraine Oisly has is vines, and trees. And more vines, and more trees….
