Domaine du Cellier des Cray - 'Cuvée des Gueux Blanc' - Jacquere - Chignin, Savoie, FR - 2021

This wine is racy, stony, electric, and something totally unexpected from the alps... well maybe we totally expected it because we buy this wine every year and love it. If you like wines that taste like they grew in rocks, you're gonna love it. Crystals... and magic,
Region: Savoie, France
Soil: Clay & Limestone
Sulfites: low additions at bottling

Old vines (50 years), densely planted on silty limestone soils worked with horse-plow. Carefully sorted whole clusters, delicately pressed and fermented in the tank without additions. Natural malolactic fermentation, 4 months aging in the tank.

Located about 10 miles southeast of Chambéry, the little village of Chignin resides at the foot of the high limestone escarpments in the southern part of the Bauges massif, central eastern France, in the Savoie region (eastern part of the Rhône-Alpes, bordering the neighboring Switzerland and Valle d'Aosta in Italy).
Adrien Berlioz took over the little family estate called “Cellier des Cray” at the beginning of 2006 and made it one of the most prestigious domaines of Chignin. The Domaine encompasses about 4.5 hectares of vineyards organically farmed, located in a "lieu dit" called "Les Viviers" near Chignin, a small village between Albertville and Chambéry, at about 390 meters above sea level.
All the vines are planted in a warm Terroir composed of rock scree on the surface and calcareous-clay sub-soil. The very steep slopes’ vineyards, with 50% of inclination for some of them, are planted with grapes such as Jacquère and Roussanne for the white and Mondeuse for the red.
Adrien works with respect for the environment using organic techniques tending towards Biodynamic, that he adapts to each parcels depending on the treatment needed to obtain the healthiest vines and grapes. Atop of not using any herbicides or inorganic fertilizers, working and plowing the ground are done with small tools to avoid tamping the soil and in the same time allow the upper ground layers and roots to breath. Everything is done mainly by hand and using a tractor will be too dangerous anyway due to the steepness of the slope in certain parcels.
This young “vigneron” is animated by great passion and rare humility. His wines transcribe the sincerity and detailed oriented attitude of the people from Savoie, but also the richness and complexity of their terroir of origin. Adrien gives his vines a paternal attention translated into his wines with great attention to produce the best this mountainous land can offer.