Sainte-Marie-la-Blanche is the PGI title for red, white and rosé wines that are produced in a region of CentralBurgundy, just east of the Côte de Beaune. The catchment area of the PGI roughly mirrors the Length of the Côte de Beaune, only a few kilometres to the east and on the lower, flatter floor of the valley that borders the Saône. A total of 20 small parishes in the South of the Côte d'Or department are covered by the title of Sainte-Marie-La-Blanche, which surrounds the Village of the same name located just 6. 5 km south-east of Beaune.
The area specified extends for about 25 km from Bonnencontre in the North to the northern tip of Saint-Loup-Geanges in the south of the department of Saône-et-Loire. This is the land beyond the lowest slopes of the Côte d'Or escarpment and does not even qualify for the regional appellation of Burgundy. The slopes just to the west are a patchwork of highly prized vineyards with names like Montrachet and Corton. But here the land is flatter, more fertile and better suited to cultivation.
This is not to say that no vines are planted here, nor that quality wine is not produced.
A ‘very promising’ vintage is expected, said the regional wine council (CIVB), as the Bordeaux 2022 harvest gets underway for reds. It’s still too early to judge fully and yields will be lower in some cases following heat, drought and also hailstorms during the growing season, yet the CIVB cited ‘attractive but small berries’ and healthy vineyard conditions during the crucial flowering period and for harvest. Europe has seen early starts to wine harvests in 2022 and the C ...
The French shipment of 600 bottles of De Haartman & Co Cognac – plus 15 boxes of Bénédictine liqueur – is believed to have been destined for Tsar Nicholas II, but was intercepted in the Baltic Sea and sunk by a German submarine in May 1917. Now Cognac house Birkedal Hartmann has refilled 300 of the recovered bottles with Cognac dating from the early 1900s, using packaging identical to the original, and is selling them for €9,000 each. The wreck of the SS Kyros was discovered by Swedish explo ...
Guillermo de Aranzabal Bittner, a director at La Rioja Alta, said the company had acquired 35ha of old vines, with a minimum age of 45 years, in the village of Elvillar at an average altitude of 600 metres. He also said La Rioja Alta would buy more old vines this year, bringing total ‘artisanal vineyard’ acquisitions to a minimum of 5oha, and potentially up to 75ha, by the end of 2022. ‘We are buying very old vineyards, pruned in the traditional way with very low production, some of which are fi ...
