100% Chenin Blanc. "L'Effraie" is from Bellivière's younger Coteaux du Loir vines, across 11 parcels totaling 3.5 hectares. These gobelet-pruned, 10-30-year-old vines are planted on flinty, sandy clay soils over tuffeau (soft limestone), are certified-biodynamic and harvested by hand. The bunches...

100% Chenin Blanc. Certified-biodynamic Bellivière owns and farms 18 hectares across 60 parcels in 5 villages in the Jasnières and Coteaux-du-Loir appellations in this northernmost part of the Touraine. "Prémices" is a selection of the most fruit-forward, younger-vine barrels and is the first...

NOT MADE IN THE 2021 VINTAGE 100% Sauvignon Blanc. Thomas-Labaille has vines averaging thirty years old with some much older on the famously steep slope of Monts Damnés in Chavignol. They are sustainably farmed and harvested by hand. The wine is fermented with native yeasts in fiberglass and cement...

100% Melon de Bourgogne. Gras Moutons is one of Pépière's classic bottlings, from a lieu-dit on a windy, south-facing slope in the Muscadet cru of Monnières-St. Fiacre. The soils are gravelly and sandy, with little clay, rich in decomposed amphibolites and gneiss. Recently, Pépière was able to add...

100% Melon de Bourgogne. Briords is a 3-hectare lieu-dit in the cru of Château Thébaud. These vines are the estate's oldest plot, planted from massale selection 60-70 years ago. The sandy clay soils are rich in granite de Thébaud, a type differing from granite de Clisson in in its higher feldspar...

100% Melon de Bourgogne. The Clisson bottling comes from a 50-100-year-old section of vines in Pepière's core vineyard near the winery in the cru of Clisson. Besides vine age, the distinguishing factor is the granite de Clisson, a very hard, compact form of granite. The very poor top soils are...

100% Chenin Blanc. The fruit from "La Jalousie" comes from the youngest estate vines and is harvested the earliest of the three Closel wines. The vines are generally 20 years old or younger and are in different parcels across all three main Closel micro-terroirs (plateau, hillsides or coteaux, and...

100% Chenin Blanc. From a 0.75-hectare, certified-organic parcel of 60-year-old estate vines on clay over limestone. Pinon’s Goutte d’Or liquoreux is its most rare, complex, vaunted sweet wine, produced thus far only in 1989, 1990 and 2018. The correct conditions are quite rare. In 2018, the grapes...

100% Chenin Blanc. Silex noir is a rare black flint found almost exclusively in this tiny corner of Vouvray, the Vallée de Cousse. it lends its name to this bottling, one of Pinon's two demi-sec bottlings (other is "Trois Argiles"). "Silex Noir" comes mainly from 2 parcels totaling 3.7 hectares on...

100% Chenin Blanc. Pinon chooses vines from more clay-forward parcels for its annual sec bottling. They average 45 years old and have been certified organic since 2007. The bunches are harvested by hand, rigorously sorted and direct-pressed slowly and gently. The juice flows by gravity into...

80% Sauvignon Blanc/20% Chardonnay. Though Cazin's quiet rock-stardom stems from his Cour-Cheverny wines from the more obscure Romorantin grape, it was his Cheverny Blanc--by law a Sauvignon/Chardonnay blend-- which led importer Joe Dressner to François's wines in the first place at a Loire wine...

Located just across the Loire River from Sancerre, the soil here has river deposits and the Portlandian limestone joins the Kimmeridgian limestone. The flint is known to add smokey notes to the wine - fumé!

From 55-year-old vines. Aged in stainless steel for 10 months. Richer and with a greater intensity than the Sancerre Blanc.

From 63-year-old Sauvignon Blanc vines planted on the famous flinted hills of Saint-Satur, on the eastern side of the Sancerre appellation. Vinified in temperature-regulated stainless steel tanks and aged for more than 6 months on the fine lees, with bâtonnage.

Pierre counts himself lucky as 70% of his vineyards for the Chavignol Blanc are south facing. The hillsides are not as steep as Beaujeu or Mont Damnes and so he is able to use a tractor. He works with natural fermentations with spontaneous yeasts in stainless steel tanks and the wines are aged on ...