Dry Jurançon is one of our favourite white wines. Jurançon is traditionally a sweet wine. Jurançon Sec (completely dry – as opposed to sparkling wine, champagne included, that is not dry when called “sec”) has had its own appellation for 50 years, which growers can use for their early-harvested grapes.
The sweet Jurançon requires a late harvest. Many still associate Jurançon with sweet wines. But the demand for white dry wines is increasing, and Jurançon Sec today, finally, has a solid reputation as one of France’s great white wines.
Production today is 50% sweet and 50% dry for the independent growers but the large cooperative Cave de Jurançon still makes more sweet than dry. Another large cooperative, Plaimont, located next door in Madiran, is now investing heavily in dry Jurançon. They do it with a wine called Yura, derived from Yuransoû, “jurançon” in Béarnese, the local language (the region is called Béarn). Plaimont seeks out grape growers with slightly cooler locations and cooler exposure for this dry wine. The plan is to make 200,000 bottles of Yura.
Beautiful Jurançon is located just south of Pau in the Southwest (Sud-Ouest). The grapes are the two magnificent petit manseng
and gros manseng, which can be supplemented with petit courbu, courbu, lauzet and camarale. We recommend you try Jurançon Sec whenever you have the chance.
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