Certified Organic, practicing Biodynamic. Certified Organic, Practicing Biodynamic. 100% Pinot Noir. Taken from vines growing on chalky and clay-chalk soils, 25 years old on average. The vineyard has been farmed organically for several years and is officially AB certified since 2017. Conversion to biodynamics in 2020. Depending on the soil, cover crops are planted between the vines in some parcels. Down each row, grass is kept mowed, and hoeing is done to remove weeds between each vine. Debudding in Spring. A green harvest is carried out every year. Grapes are 100% hand-harvested and rigorously sorted. Grapes are carried to the cellar in a bin fitted with a vibrating system; that and a vibrating table and the care of 5 to 6 persons ensure grapes are sorted before being destemmed. Fermentation in stainless steel tanks, with natural yeasts starts after a cold maceration. Tank time lasts 20 to 25 days depending on the vintage. This wine is aged in ‘tronc conique’ oak vats for 18 months. No fining, filtering done on cellulose plates.
2022 Domaine François Crochet Sancerre Rouge, Loire Valley, France
$42.99
ABOUT THIS WINE
ABOUT THIS PRODUCER
In Sancerre, three villages have come to be associated with wines of distinction: Chavignol, Ménétréol-sous-Sancerre, and Bué. François Crochet lives in Bué and farms around eleven hectares, with vines predominantly around this home village (including around 3.5ha of Pinot Noir!). Some of these 30 parcels Crochet works are in several renowned single-vineyards in Bué, including lieux-dits Petit Chemarin, Grand Chemarin and Le Chêne Marchand. These vineyards are limestone-based, rendering a distinctive mineral quality to Crochet’s wines that isn’t always found in the more industrially-produced wines of the region. Of course, each parcellaire wine has its own personality, but the single-vineyard wines are aged on fine lees in large foudre for 18 months, adding openness and elegance—a style long abandoned by most producers in the appellation. Crochet’s methods are gentle: fruit is hand-harvested and whole-cluster pressed, making for pure, delicate expression—less ripeness and dullness, less of that “Sancerre-y” character of which one might complain, which has its origin in rough handling of fruit, poor farming, and over-cropped yields. Since 2019, only wild yeasts have been used in the winery, deepening the wines’ profiles; since 2017, the vineyards are worked both organically (certified) and biodynamically (practicing since 2018 and conversion completed in 2020).
Details:
| Grape(s) | Pinot Noir |
| Farming | Organic |