Maxime Graillot's estate-grown, single-vineyard Crozes is a blinder in 2019. As always it comes from a single vineyard near the village of Beaumont-Monteux, only a couple of kilometres from his father's vines. Here, in the most south-easterly part of the appellation, the soils are full of gravel and alluvial stones, low in clay and fast-draining—very similar to the Domaine Alain Graillot soils in Les Chênes Verts, just to the north. This soil type lends itself to a refined, aromatic Syrah with a pronounced savoury profile. Planted throughout the 1980s, the vines are now managed organically (certification is due next year).
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 2019 was fermented in concrete vats and then racked into one, two and three-year-old Burgundy barrels purchased from some of the top estates in Burgundy. There is also a tiny component (less than 10%) of new barrels that are 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 then brought together for three months in large fût tronconique. It was bottled unfiltered.