Laroche Chablis 1er Cru L’Essence des Climats 2025
£33.45
The wine
L Essence des Climats is a blend across several premier cru parcels rather than a single named site, which is unusual in Chablis and a deliberate choice: it shows the tier as a whole rather than one slope.
Chablis sits on Kimmeridgian limestone, a 150-million-year-old seabed packed with fossil oyster shells, which is the source of the flinty, saline character that separates it from every other Chardonnay. The appellation is heavily fragmented, so most producers work many small parcels rather than contiguous blocks. Domaine Laroche is one of the oldest houses in Chablis, based in the Obediencérie, a ninth-century monastic building in the centre of the town.
The producer
Laroche
View all Laroche winesDomaine Laroche is one of the most respected names in Chablis, based in the Obédiencerie, a former monastery where wine has been made for over a thousand years. Its wines are benchmarks of Chablis purity and racy acidity.
Laroche's holdings are remarkable in this fragmented region, with 90 hectares of vines including 21 hectares of premier cru and six of grand cru. This gives the domaine unrivalled access to Chablis's finest slopes.
The range runs from fresh, precise village wines such as Saint Martin and Les Chanoines to premier cru bottlings like Les Vaudevey and the blended L'Essence des Climats. Each shows crystalline fruit, minerality and drive.
Despite its venerable heritage, Laroche is a dynamic, forward looking producer. Its wines are pure, precise and true to Chablis. This is white Burgundy from one of the region's great houses.
