Jerome Bretaudeau Domaine de Bellevue Pinot Noir Statera 2023 CS20230718 Kadarka among them—that spent 40

Kadarka among them—that spent 40 hours on skins and finished malo in barrel

The nose runs to huckleberry and blueberry coulis with green walnut and baking spice

This ancient volcanic activity created what one geologist called "a Disneyland for geologists"—a patchwork of acidic porphyritic soils with pH levels as low as 4 and high iron content that gives the wines a distinctive ferrous minerality

with the chalky tension you'd want from the appellation

Jerome Bretaudeau Domaine de Bellevue Pinot Noir Statera 2023 CS20230718 Kadarka among them—that spent 40Pinot Noir in Muscadet sounds like a fever dream, but Jerome Bretaudeau plants it on granite and pink and white quartz and the results are stunning. Statera (Latin for balance) is delicate, perfumed, and silky, with the texture of fine Burgundy filtered through a distinctly Loire prism. Biodynamic farming, indigenous yeast fermentation, aging in barrel with minimal sulfur, no fining or filtration. Production is tiny and the wine is in serious demand