The Côtes du Jura is the regional appellation of the Jura, a narrow band of vineyard running some eighty kilometres from Salins-les-Bains in the north to Saint-Amour in the south, on the western foothills of the mountains facing the Bresse plain. The soils are the key: grey, blue and red marls, laid down in a shallow sea, heavy and cold and quite unlike the limestone of Burgundy across the valley.

Five grapes are grown. Chardonnay and the local Savagnin make the whites, Poulsard, Trousseau and Pinot Noir the reds, which are pale and fragrant rather than dark. The region is known for its oxidative tradition: wines left under a veil of yeast in barrel to make vin jaune, grapes dried on straw for the sweet vin de paille, and the fortified Macvin. A generation of growers working with minimal sulphur here has made the Jura one of the most watched small regions in France.