Chateau Grande Cassagne is a small estate run by the Dardé brothers (Laurent and Benoît). The property is near the village of Saint-Gilles. The Dardé brothers produce very good Rhone-style wines at value prices. Their wines are hand-made and the fruit is hand-farmed and organically-grown. Their first vintage was in 1988 and their wines have been imported by Robert Kacher since 1994.

The Cuvée Cassanus is a blend of 60% Roussanne and 40% Marsanne. 80% is stainless steel fermented and 20% is done in French oak barriques. Golden straw in color. White flower, citrus, melon and a touch of honey aromatics. Green apple with pear, lemon, green olive and limestone on the palate. It is a little flabby, but shows good richness and minerality. Very food friendly.

I bought this on sale at Calvert Woodley for $6.99 a bottle. Note that this wine sells at $8.99 on sale in the store, but is available at the sale price of $6.99 on their website.

The wine normally retails at $10-11 a bottle. At $10 a bottle this is a good value, but at under $7, it is one of the top 10 white wine values I have encountered this year.

It is often difficult to find something serviceable at under $7 a bottle, but I actually would have called this a value play at $10 a bottle — and would not have been surprised (or disappointed) to have learned I paid $13 a bottle. Not a bad little quaffer this one….