2021 Maxime Graillot Domaine des Lises Crozes-Hermitage, Northern Rhone

As always, Maxime’s estate Crozes comes from vineyards near the village of Beaumont-Monteux, only a few kilometres from the Domaine Alain Graillot vines. The lieux-dits are called Les Bosquets and Les Pichères. Here, in the most south-easterly part of the appellation, the fast-draining soils are made up mostly of alluvial stones and gravel. They are low in clay and, in fact, very similar to the Domaine Alain Graillot soils in Les Chênes Verts, just to the north. Planted throughout the 1980s, the vines are now managed organically (certification is due soon).
 
The fermentations are entirely natural, and Graillot Jr. uses only a small whole-bunch component, usually in the realm of 20-30%. It is, therefore, a wine that tends to ‘come around’ earlier than the 100% whole-bunch wines that carry the Alain Graillot name. The 2021 was fermented in concrete vats and then racked into one-, two- and three-year-old Burgundy barrels—purchased from some of the top estates—and a 12-hectolitre Stockinger cask. There is also a tiny component (less than 10%) of new barrels purchased from the Atelier Centre France, whose bespoke steam-bent barrels are now used at Guiberteau, Didier Dagueneau and François Chidaine. The wine spent 11 months in barrel and was brought together for three months in large fût tronconique. It is bottled unfiltered.
 
A brilliant wine! Although it was a tricky year—frost, hail and lots of pressure—the 2021 is a fabulous release for this wine. It’s sappy and mineral with a delicious core of blackberry, dark cherry and iodine scented fruit and a twist of herbal/smoky complexity. Graillot is now aging this wine for six months longer to allow for finer integration between the wine’s fruit and tannin, and it has really worked here. Those who love classic Northern Rhône Syrah will be thrilled.