Béléna 2024

Name: Béléna 2024
Brand: Maison Crochet
SKU: maisoncrochet-belenavmq-2024-12.5%-750ml
Price: 72.00 SGD
Availability: InStock

$72.00

Béléna is Wilfried Crochet's most serious sparkling wine: a traditional-method blanc de noirs made from 50% Pinot Noir and 50% Chardonnay, grown on the limestone and clay soils that share their geology with the Côte des Blancs, aged on the lees in bottle, riddled by hand, disgorged, and finished extra brut. No sweetness to smooth anything over.

The blanc de noirs technique presses the dark-skinned Pinot Noir quickly and gently, separating the juice from the skins before any colour can transfer, giving a white wine with the body and texture that only red grapes carry. The Chardonnay brings precision and citrus lift; the Pinot Noir brings the structure, the red fruit tension, and the fullness of texture that makes this wine worth saving for something. Wild strawberry, brioche, a tight mineral line through the middle. The finish is long and dry. This is what Lorraine sparkling wine can be when it takes itself seriously, and when the winemaker has the patience to let the method do its work.

Pairs well with oysters, grilled scallops, roast chicken, or aged soft cheese. Works just as well as an apéritif, opened an hour before anyone arrives.

Pairing Suggestions

Aburi Hotate
Chili Crabs
A quick one before your guests arrives

About Maison Crochet

Wilfried Crochet left Lorraine at 18 and spent years working through Bordeaux, Champagne, Burgundy, the Rhône, Tasmania and Greece before coming back in 2016 to the five hectares his family had farmed in Bulligny since the 1990s. He came back because the limestone and clay under those vines is the same geological formation as the Côte des Blancs, and he had spent enough time in enough cellars to know what that should be worth.

The estate went fully organic in 2019. Harvest is by hand. Gamay, Pinot Noir, Auxerrois and Chardonnay are vinified parcel by parcel, and Wilfried decides after tasting what gets blended and what gets bottled alone. The sparkling wines follow the traditional method: still base wine, a second fermentation triggered inside the sealed bottle, then a long rest on the lees. The lees matter. Dead yeast cells break down slowly and give the wine a biscuit and brioche texture that cannot be replicated in a tank, however long you leave it. After riddling and disgorgement the wines go out with minimal dosage. Wilfried prefers extra brut, which keeps the wine close to what the limestone produces without sweetness covering anything over.

He left the Côtes de Toul AOC in 2004. The rules did not fit what he was making, so he stopped following them. Every bottle now carries Vin de France. Thirty thousand bottles a year, sold on allocation. Not a concession. A choice.

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