Ah – the anticipation. The ritual of opening so carefully. Not to mention finding the right filter for the photos!
Previous bottles of this from Bertagna were fabulous, but: Ah – the cloudy wine. The smell of mushrooms, of beef, of cork – lots and lots of cork! The sound of wine pouring down the sink because we don’t have the chance to make beef bourguignon in the next week or so…
A project that has been over three years in gestation. And the seed for this new approach all began with the ‘tractor-driver war!‘
No, not really a war! But a few years back, due to a lack of communication/transparency, tractor-drivers (in particular it seemed) had the ability to get a job at a good domaine, work there for several months then move to another domaine for a higher salary offer – then move again and again every six months. It was not so much the escalation of salaries that stung people into action, as much as the clear indication that for all the jobs at domaines and their suppliers, there had to be an easier way to find people for open positions.
A 2019 survey of 500 Domaines and 50 Maisons de négoce (carried out jointly by the CAVB and the FNEB) revealed nearly 700 open positions for wine sales-people, for maintenance employees, tractor operators, administrative employees, packaging operators, vineyard employees etcetera. It should be pointed out that Burgundy comprises more than 4,500 Domaines, 400 Maisons and 17 cooperative cellars – so the actual figure for open positions was certainly much, much higher.
With nearly €1 million Euros of investment, you can already get more than a flavour of it from the 1st September, that’s the new website launch-date to put potential employers and employees together.
*”The website is a platform that brings together information on the vine and wine sector in Burgundy, to put candidates and professionals in touch with each other:
“For candidates: this is a website for information on the various specialisations, training courses and partner training organisations in the sector. There are many videos, job descriptions and other information available. Additionally, there are the contacts for training organizations, admission conditions, funding possibilities as well as the procedures to be followed. VITA Bourgogne is also the site to find all the job offers in the sector in Burgundy and apply online in a few clicks.
“For professionals: the website streamlines the recruitment of future employees, particularly offering consulting advice and information on hiring, work-study programs etcetera.
“This website will be supplemented with an increased presence on social networks such as Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, Youtube and LinkedIn with the aim to grow the VITA Bourgogne community. As soon as sanitary conditions allow, the entire VITA Bourgogne team will be present at events in the Bourgogne Franche-Comté Region i.e. career forums, student fairs, career days, etcetera.
“Vita Bourgogne warmly thanks the Bureau Interprofessionnel des Vins de Bourgogne for its support from the very beginning of this great program.”
*My translation and summary of the Press-Release.
A ‘northern Burgundy night! A few ‘house’ Chablis to start the night – because we were 4!
2010 Benoît Cantin, Irancy
‘Only the standard Irancy, but a magnum! Of-course, a cork that broke in two!
Medium colour – just! The nose has a small vibration of fruit and a herby note – rosemary – interesting and quite inviting. Nice and freshly mouth-filling, I like the energy here. Not über-concentrated, more of an airy style to this, but this is tasty, easy to appreciate wine: a magnum of not so great wine tends to hang around, but this was a bottle that emptied quite quickly for its size. A similar level to a very good Bourgogne here.
Rebuy – Yes
I’d hate to think of myself as an ‘evangelist’ for anything because I’m a fan of balance; as such, when it comes to sealing a bottle I’ll buy wine that has been stoppered with anything if I’m intending to drink it within 2-3 years – both colours – but if I’m cellaring whites I want DIAM. The ‘traditional’ alternative has cost me too much over the years. I’d take screwcap too, but I so rarely see them. For reds I don’t have any problem staying with cork, but here’s an interesting example of one of the earliest DIAM bottlings, but still in perfect condition after 15 years.
2005 Roger Belland, Santenay 1er La Comme
DIAM seals were commercially available since 2004, here’s an example for an early adopter, but in red. This seal was in perfect condition – wine ingress amounting to no more than 2mm – at that rate the wine will age 100 years before the seal is breached!
Plenty of colour. Fresh, intense, the last vestiges of creamy oak – this nose is now far more interesting than when the wine was young. There’s a little grain of tannin at the base of this wine but the texture is good and the concentration for the label is very impressive – that’s the vintage of course. The creamy oak on the nose overlays the fruit on the palate too – but gives this wine an extra something to its baseline and little extra gloss. The flavour widening impressively in the finish. It’s a shame that this is my last of these; what was once concentrated, oaky and lacking a little clarity is now very good – another 5 years and it could be a dry fine Santenay indeed!
Rebuy – Yes
Some people were still smiling as they harvested though 🙂
Well, you have ease yourself out of such things – no(?)
2018 Françoise André, Pernand-Vergelesses Les Pins
Plenty of colour. A nose that has depth but is floral and forward too. Plenty of saline edge to the concentration, practically a little mint in the middle structure too. Young but already accessible – still, the least ready of these three wines – so I’d wait 2-3 years …
Rebuy – Yes
2013 Bouchard Père, Chassagne-Montrachet En Remilly
54mm diam 10 – top!
A wide nose, of textured floral depth and faint tarte au citron – I would say not just an inviting nose but distinguished too. Silky, lithe, direct – more Chevalier than Chassagne without doubt – widening with citrus intensity. Gorgeous wine…
Rebuy Yes
2018 Françoise André, Corton-Renardes
A little test of some whole-clusters in this vintage – and here’s a lovely, fresh, floral complexity with a finely focused and pretty berry fruit. Silken texture, melting structure – far too easy to drink but that’s the new Corton vernacular. Too delicious…
Rebuy – Yes
Sort of, the end…
Today we completed the harvest for about 85% of the domaine, but then there’s a problem; our last two cuvées – Pernand Les Pins Blanc and Pommard Vaumuriens are not ready for picking and they won’t be for a few more days. So it’s good-bye to our picking team. The domaine will now be concentrating on the work in cuverie for the next few days.
Today we started in Corton-Charlemagne, a little over 0.3 hectares on the Pernand side of the hill. The grapes looked beautiful on the vines but the truth is on the triage table where we had to remove some dried/roast grapes – very aromatic on the table though – even wearing a mask! Next was Pernand 1er Sous Fretille. A little larger berry-size, more uniform than the Charlemagne and with less to triage – some hail impacts excepted – excellent quality to this fruit. The Sous Fretille bookended our lunch followed by the last vines for the team – Beaune Montée Rouge – and it’s steep up here! These had a little dried material plus some less ripe to triage – the less ripe due to not making leaf-thinning here to protect the clusters a little more from the sun. Very successful Beaune again, but probably yesterday’s villages and certainly the Reversées set higher standards for the fruit.
We battled quite an influx of ladybugs today, but given the style of the fruit, most were collected below the vibrating table. Those that made it onto the triage table were collected and dispersed under the trees outside the domaine – kind organic 😉
And lunch? I hear you breathlessly asking! Yep, there was wine, probably too much, certainly enough that I didn’t open my bottle – but clearly at no loss!
2013 Samuel Billaud, Chablis Les Preuses
Wax-topped, a good cork here.
Hmm – now that’s a wide and attractive nose – really engaging – adding depth with aeration. Wide, plenty of impact, waves of flavour nicely balanced if not showing either bracing acidity or steely minerality. This is simply a completely delicious wine. The nose certainly from Chablis, the flavours a little less so, but that’s the vintage!
Rebuy – Yes
Jumping a mere 30 years further back:
1983 Raveneau, Chablis 1er Montée de Tonnerre
Only the last 2mm of the cork was lost into the bottle – but it was easily ‘fished out.’
Deeper colour but aromatically not a bit oxidised; complex, mineral, even a touch reductive – very complex indeed – engrossing wine that lacks ‘easy’ aromas – or flavours! This has a proper line of direct Chablis shape, great acidity and much less sweetness than the 2013. I kept coming back to this great bottle, but I can appreciate why many more will gravitate to the easier and more delicious Billaud…
Rebuy – No Chance!
I didn’t open the following wines, so no cork-reports 🙂
2014 Michel Bouzereau, Volnay 1er Les Aussey
Plenty of colour here. The nose is a match for colour – impact, indeed a little monolithic – it needs plenty of airy to start becoming more relaxed and a little more overtly floral. Like the nose, this wine is clearly such a youngster. Return in 5 years – full of material and nicely shaped – but a wine in waiting.
Rebuy – Maybe
2010 Mongeard-Mugneret, Vosne-Romanée 1er Les Orveaux
Much more modest colour than the Volnay. Ooh – now that’s a beauty – the nose airy but complex – almost layered with a proper Vosne-style in combination with high-toned florals. The palate is equally elegant and completely delicious. I would go as far as to say captivating – could it have a bit more concentration for such a reputed place? Probably yes – but a deliciously captivating drink. Bravo!
Rebuy – Yes
Just around the corner – the Château de Beaune
A cooler start today – I went back home for a sweatshirt – it’s only 3 minutes each way!
For day 6 of our harvest we started the with Savigny-Vergelesses Blanc – and that was it for the morning, Vergelesses without end! There were occasional hail impacts, similarly occasional bunches with some oïdium, but generally, the fruit for here came as nicely open bunches of medium-sized fruit with very little roast/dried material to remove. The afternoon was all red – villages Beaune from near (behind) the Renault garage on the road from Beaune direction Pommard. The triage here was 99.9% about removing leaves and some desiccated berries, but shock(!) – I encountered my first bunch with some rot – by the end of the day it was still the only bunch this year, so far! Looks like a great year for Beaunes!
And then, of course, there came lunch:
The Hermitage Blanc I’m ill-equipped to describe – the nose was almost clean in a soap-powder way – powerful wine and very tasty but one glass was enough for me.
2001 Tastevinage, Gevrey-Chambertin
Very interesting! The cork came out in one piece, luckily, otherwise I’d have lost an important clue to the producer – because the label provided no clues at all which is unusual for a Tastevinage bottle. The cork clearly stamped with ‘Mes Favourites’ so a wine from Burguet!
Relatively pale coloured. A nose that begins in quite a fresh and appealing way and then just gets better from there, becoming more and more floral with aeration. The palate no more than a middle-weight, indeed hardly that, but fresh and elegant – delicate even. Really a delicious bottle that just got better and better. Lovely wine!
Rebuy – Yes
1995 Daniel Rion, Vosne-Romanée 1er Beaumonts
A cork that yet again came out in dozens of pieces – and for the record, I’ve used a different corkscrew every day.
Also quite a light coloured wine – very similar to the Tastevinage wine. Also an airy nose, but of more width and depth than the Burguet wine, and a subtly different floral character- clearly violets here with a little Vosne-spice. In the mouth, this wine widens and widens as you head into the finish – despite the cork, it’s showing terrifically today with lovely acidity and well-controlled tannic texture. Another winner – we have done very well this week – so far!
Rebuy – Yes
Tomorrow there’s Charlemagne, maybe some more Beaunes and/or even some Pernand-Vergelesses…
Waiting for the grapes…
The day that Charles Lachaux of Vosne-Romanée finishes his harvest, we are about 60% of the way through, though Charles has quite different viticulture to most domaines. Many others in the Côte de Nuits are still not looking to start until the middle of next week – or even later! Since yesterday, much of the Côte de Beaune white harvest is underway – administratively, Mondays are always the best time to start!
So today, we started with Bourgogne Côte d’Or Blanc from Chorey (where else?), followed by Chorey Rouge, followed by Bourgogne Côte d’Or Blanc (again), followed by Chorey Rouge (again!) – that took our whole day. I may have forgotten to mention the home domaine’s new innovation for 2020 – a second press for the whites – and it’s bigger too – 35 hl versus the 24 of the old one – and it’s not a replacement – we now have 2! Despite the removal of this important bottleneck, we still had to split the picking/triage today as both presses were full. The first session with the Bourgogne Blanc saw ‘almost’ zero oïdium but quite a few impacts from hail – virtually unreported in July which we will probably also see in the white Pernands over the coming days. The weather was dry and warm after this hail, hence, no rot and easy to triage. The red, as yesterday, the easiest Chorey I’ve triaged at this domaine. This parcel was near to a wood which retained a lot of damp near the vines and so plenty of rot too – the trees nearest the vines were cut down last year – it’s made a massive difference.
But I know that you are all on the edge of your seats, straining to know a little of the analytics of these baby 2020 wines – so here you go:
2020 Beaune 1er Blanc, pH 3.2 with about 1.9 g/l of malic acid and a potential alcohol of 13.15
2020 Beaune 1er Rouge, pH 3.3 with about 1.9 g/l of malic acid and a potential alcohol of 13.45
2020 Savigny Rouge, pH 3.2 with about 1.9 g/l of malic acid and a potential alcohol of 13.40
So not much in the way of tax savings if they are exported to the US!
Lunch saw the restoration of our usual traiteur – he had been on holiday. It wasn’t really to mark the occasion, but it turned out that we had some nice wines:
1990 Pierre Marey et Fils, Corton-Charlemagne
A new ‘old’ domaine for me that no longer exists. I believe that Brigitte Berthelemot may be exploiting most of these Charlemagne vines now. A poor cork that really had us laughing – It had clearly snapped with only a small lean of the corkscrew but going in for the second piece I seemingly did the trick with no need for decanting. But when I attempted to pour the wine, nothing happened – there was a third piece still in the neck – oh how I laughed – grr!
Deeply golden in colour. The nose has impact and sweetness – the faintest suggestion of oxidation yet it remained a lovely invitation – with time in the glass taking on a more smoky note and less of that suggestion of oxidation. In the mouth it was powerful, forward, sweet wine with the merest trace of oxidation on the first sip – frankly, I never thought about it thereafter. Clearly for drinking now – but also really for enjoying now – very attractively balanced despite its obvious concentration.
Rebuy – Maybe
2013 Taupenot-Merme, Morey St.Denis 1er La Roitte
DIAM-sealed – no problems of course.
Medium-plus colour. This nose is high-toned, pure and has an engaging, practically floral, dimension that offsets a little graphite-style minerality. In the mouth I kind of like the edginess here – fine acidity, a little direct and structural but pure too. Far from the ripeness of recent vintages – but who needs that? Though for such an excellent 1er cru I might have expected a little more power – but that’s the vintage. Excellent and very much enjoyed.
Rebuy – Yes
2000 Thomas-Moillard, Romanée St.Vivant
I had to go very carefully, but the cork came out in one piece. Here’s a wine (domaine!) that needs 20 years as a minimum – looks like we might be lucky then!
Deeply coloured – they used to like to extract! The nose is wide and brings the impression of silk – complex too but with a little brett I thought – nobody else seemed to care – that’s French wineries for you! In the mouth though, this really showed the nobility of the terroir if not the winemaking – weight of flavour but immaculately textured and delivering waves of flavour – very long finishing too. The nose left me unfulfilled but everyone else loved this wine – while I returned to the Riotte, they finished this bottle!
Rebuy – Maybe
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