Henri Bonneau never did single vineyard cuvées, all was rather based on his palate through barrel tasting. The estate keeps performing the same ritual: the team tastes periodically all the barrels to determine whether the wine is ready and to assign each barrel to a specific cuvée. On this matter Henri used to say “there is no secret” … But the family has of course kept some traditions. Henri Bonneau was a traditionalist and never felt into the trendy habit to add Syrah to his wines, insisting that “it all boils down to the Grenache”. He wisely considered grapes like Mourvèdre, Cinsault, Clairette, Counoise, Vaccarèse as “just like the salt and pepper in the soup”.

The winemaking is simple, based on some common-sense recipes rather that any kind of oenology. Basically, grapes are picked at a very low yield, about 10-12 hl/ha. Harvesting is very late, grapes are not destemmed and the maceration is not exaggerated (two to three weeks in open concrete vat). When the fermentation (with indigenous yeasts) in cement tanks is finished the wine goes into very old barrels from Burgundy. The wines don’t see any new oak. As a matter of fact, there is no oak in the cellar younger than at least a decade. Traditionally, the wines spend a minimum of 30 months in old oak.

Here it stays until the estate finds it ready to be bottled - maybe after 6, 8 or 10 years. Fining is done with half a dozen egg whites per barrel. Nothing is filtered.