Domaine les Alexandrins

Les Alexandrins is based in Tain-l'Hermitage, the town at the foot of the Hermitage hill in the northern Rhône, and it was set up by Nicolas Jaboulet and Alexandre Caso. Jaboulet is the heir to a family of winemakers established in Tain-l'Hermitage since 1834, which is one of the oldest names in the appellation. Caso is a specialist in the terroirs of the northern Rhône. The two of them run the business between them, and it is their two names on everything the domaine makes.

They farm 78 hectares of estate vineyards, all certified organic, spread across the appellations of the northern Rhône. That is a substantial holding for a domaine founded this century, and it lets them do something very few producers here can: offer the region's full range. Their cellar door list runs to Hermitage in red and white, Côte-Rôtie, Cornas, Condrieu, Saint-Joseph in red and white, and Crozes-Hermitage in red and white, alongside a Côtes du Rhône and an entry-level pair from the Collines Rhodaniennes.

The important thing to understand when you are buying their wine is that there are two labels and they are not the same. Maison les Alexandrins is the négociant side, a more modern and creative style, largely from younger vines. Domaines les Alexandrins comes only from their own plots and is worked, in their words, with artisanal care. The Domaine bottlings are named single sites rather than blends across the appellation, and that distinction is the reason to seek them out.

Where they sit against the neighbours is straightforward. Hermitage and Côte-Rôtie are the famous hills and they are priced accordingly; Saint-Joseph runs along the opposite bank of the river and Crozes-Hermitage wraps around behind Hermitage. Both are where you go for northern Rhône Syrah without the Hermitage price, and both have a reputation for being variable, because the appellations are large and a lot of what is bottled is blended across them. Working a named lieu-dit is how a producer answers that. Les Alexandrins farm old Syrah in Crozes-Hermitage and century-old plots at Tournon in Saint-Joseph, and they bottle the good ones separately: Les Chaflans and Les Garennes in Crozes-Hermitage, Les Ponts in Saint-Joseph, La Caille in Condrieu.

Their winemaking is deliberately unshowy and consistent across the reds. Hand harvest, traditional vinification, 70% destemmed, a three-day cold maceration, punching down and pumping over in alternation, then twenty days fermenting in barrel. The ageing is in used wood rather than new: two-year-old barrels for the Crozes and two-year-old demi-muids for the Saint-Joseph. That is a producer trying to show you the site rather than the cooper.

Les Chaflans in Crozes-Hermitage and Les Ponts in Saint-Joseph are both single-site Domaine bottlings, which makes them an unusually good pair to drink alongside each other.