Domaine Yves Gangloff

If you visit the annual Côte-Rôtie tasting at the heart of the region every January known as the Marché d’Ampuis, you’ll undoubtedly see a very long queue for one of the stands. No prizes for guessing which. Demand for Yves Gangloff’s wines has exploded in recent years, making them very difficult to come by.

Yves, who has the look and charisma of an ageing French rockstar, visited Ampuis in 1978 to see his brother. Falling in love with a local woman, he decided to stay – so he needed to find a job. So he took a position as a vineyard worker for Delas.

He was lucky to buy land when it was still cheap, and gradually amassed 3.3 ha in Côte-Rôtie, 2.5ha in Condrieu and 2.5ha in Saint-Joseph, making both red and white. He makes two Côte-Rôties, largely destemmed, which undergo short macerations and brief élevage in barriques, around 15% new oak.

His Côte-Rôties are among the most elegant and refined wines of the Northern Rhône, and are worth the effort that it takes to find them.