{"product_id":"nv-clandestin-les-semblables-austral-champagne-france-2022-base","title":"NV Clandestin, Les Semblables, Austral, Champagne, France (2022 base)","description":"\u003cp\u003eBenoît Doussot grew up in Beaune and trained in Meursault with Jean-Philippe Fichet, one of the most exacting white-wine makers in Burgundy, while studying at the Lycée Viticole de Beaune. Freshly graduated in the summer of 2015, he devised Clandestin with Bertrand Gautherot of Vouette \u0026amp; Sorbée and made his first wines in a converted barn beside the Vouette \u0026amp; Sorbée cellar in Buxières-sur-Arce. He had no family vines, so he built the project a different way: a micro-négoce buying only organically farmed grapes from now eleven growers in the Côte des Bar, supporting their conversion to organics, paying them fairly and letting them taste the finished wine rather than watching their fruit disappear into a big house's blend. In 2023 he completed a winery of his own in Landreville, built on two levels so the wines move by gravity. The inspiration behind Clandestin is geological. The Côte des Bar sits on Kimmeridgian marl and Portlandian limestone, Jurassic soils closer to Chablis than to the chalk of the Marne, and Benoît keeps each cuvée to a single stratum and exposure so the difference can be tasted. Fermentations are long and spontaneous, the still wines spend twelve months in older 500- and 600-liter barrels, which he prefers to Burgundian pièces because they keep the wines chiseled and need less sulfur, then a winter in vat before bottling and about fifteen months on the lees. Nothing is dosed.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eAustral takes its name from the south. It is 100% pinot noir from seven south-facing plots, the vines planted mid-slope in Kimmeridgian marl, and it is made the way every Clandestin cuvée is made: the still wine aged in older barrels, then a second fermentation and fifteen months sur lattes. This bottling is built on the 2022 harvest and was disgorged in April 2025.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe 2022 growing season in Champagne was sunny and dry, and on these south-facing slopes the pinot noir reached full, golden ripeness. Austral is layered and deep: red apple and quince, raspberry, brioche and toasted hazelnut, with a note of acacia honey on the finish. The mouthfeel is rich and rounded, with the marl's chalky salinity keeping the wine on its feet.\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Yes Society","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":52263529611560,"sku":"ATNV22CLANDESTINAUSTRAL750","price":110.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0779\/1794\/6152\/files\/Clandestin_LesSemblables_Austral_233921c3-52dd-4a44-8f67-73d4ad9fd25e.jpg?v=1789081140","url":"https:\/\/yes-society.com\/products\/nv-clandestin-les-semblables-austral-champagne-france-2022-base","provider":"Yes Society","version":"1.0","type":"link"}