Martin Texier 'La Rouvière' Blanc 2024

Martin is Eric Texier's son. He studied economics, spent time in New York working at wine shops, and eventually realized he wanted to come home and make wine himself. Smart kid.

Now he has five hectares in the village of St-Julien-en-St-Alban, right on the border between the Northern Rhône and the Ardèche. He farms in a way that's hard to neatly label, somewhere between biodynamic and regenerative, working with young vines planted in 2018 on granitic soils.

This beautiful white is a 50/50 split of Clairette and Roussanne. The grapes are pressed directly into concrete tanks, fermented with indigenous yeasts, then aged in neutral oak. No sulfur added. Unfined, unfiltered. Just the wine.

It smells like everything good about the Rhône all at once: fennel, dried grapefruit peel, quince, a little rose, melon rind, pistachio paste (yes!), and river stones. It's round and electric, with a salty, mineral tension that's honestly pretty cool.

Open it with grilled fish, a plate of oysters, or just to catch up with a friend.