The monks of the Burgundy countryside play a crucial role in the story of French winemaking. For about a thousand years between the 5th and 15th centuries, French monks tended vines and made wine on the now famous slopes. Through tasting the products of the rich Burgundian soils (and often the soils themselves), they first developed the idea of terroir.
The 2015 red Burgundies have been great successes. Warm weather, small berries, and low yields made a vintage that many critics have called one of the best in decades. Most of the fancier 2015s are dense and tannic today, signaling excellent aging potential, but needing time to reach maturity.
We spent years in search of a nice Aligoté. Forever in the shadow of the finest Chardonnays in the world, Burgundy’s “other white grape” is neither profound nor expensive. Most of our searches yielded disappointment: wines with too much acid, too little body, or both.
Burgundy is where Chardonnay finds its finest expression. In cold climates, the grape can be acidic and thin; in hot climates, it runs the risk of high alcohol and over extraction. But in Burgundy, Chardonnay has the potential to strike its most elegant balance between soft, mouthfilling fruit, and crisp, refreshing acidity.
Visiting Pierre Bourée is always a treat. The Bourée family domaine in Gevrey-Chambertin is home to a warren of underground cellars, holding stocks dating well back into the 1980s. It can be hard for wine buyers to track the provenance and history of bottles from a decade ago, but at Bourée it’s simple — they’ve never left home.
No town in France is more celebrated for its wines than Vosne-Romanée. Home to some of the world’s finest and most sought-after bottles, Vosne is undoubtedly the most famous Pinot Noir village on earth. Michel Gros is a lifelong resident. His family has made wine there for centuries, and his mother was once the mayor.
Most people consider the white wines of Burgundy to be among the world’s finest wines of any color. Nowhere else does Chardonnay achieve the same balance between fruit, minerality, acidity, richness, and elegance. With production limited and ever increasing demand, the prices of white Burgundy have risen almost as quickly as those of red.
If Vosne-Romanée is the paragon of Burgundian sophistication, then neighbor Nuits-St-Georges has the humbler charm of a country gentleman. Spread across five miles of varied terroir, the wines of Nuits-St-Georges range from spiced and elegant to meaty and rich. Wines from plots near the Vosne border can borrow a bit of spice and silk from their neighbor.
“Oaked” or “unoaked” sounds like a yes-no question, but it really is a range. Most of the wines we import spend some time in oak, but the strength of its influence depends on the age and size of the barrel, the chauffe (how heavily the inside is charred), and time in the barrel.
Chablis is a singular place. Its combination of deep stony soils and cool climate exists nowhere else on earth. These factors produce a similarly unique wine — mineral and crisp, pure and clean. Our goal as importers is to find wines that reflect the place from which they come, and there is no better place to find such wines than…
In Burgundy as in real estate, location is everything. Today’s wine comes from a vineyard classified Premier Cru but surrounded by five Grand Crus. It sits along the famous stretch of Grand Crus between Morey-St-Denis and Gevrey-Chambertin, and many believe its classification has as much to do with centuries-ago politics as with terroir.
If you ever need to convert someone to white Burgundy, pour them a glass of Meursault. Made from pure Chardonnay and grown in soils balanced between marl and chalk, Meursault is some of most opulent white wine in the world. Chardonnay can make rich, mouthfilling wines in most locations -- but those from Meursault also contain elegance, minerality, and balance.
It’s getting harder to find bargains in Burgundy. Demand continues to increase, and the small supply is even smaller after a string of difficult years in the vines. At many domaines, the least available cuvées are at the Bourgogne level.
“Puligny-Montrachet is where Burgundian Chardonnay is at its most complete,” writes Clive Coates MW. The tiny town, covering over less than one square mile, has made highly sought-after wine for nearly a thousand years. Today many consider it, as Coates puts it, “the greatest white wine commune on earth.”
The 2015 vintage in Red Burgundy has been called one of the best in decades. Ideal growing conditions produced perfectly ripe fruit, resulting in wines that are full bodied, deeply colored, and simply delicious. We tasted over a hundred during our tasting trip last month, and the vintage is undoubtedly one of the best we’ve seen.