2023 Domaine François Crochet Sancerre, Loire Valley, France

ABOUT THIS WINE

Certified organic. 100% Sauvignon Blanc. Sauvignon Blanc vines planted on the three types of soil of the Appellation, that is 80 % chalky soil – locally known as “caillottes”, 10% clay chalky soil and 10% flint. The vines are 25 years old on average. Hand-harvested. Pressed and fermented with natural yeast. Aged on its fine lees for 9 months in stainless steel.

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).