In the shadow of greatness.
Some comparisons should never be made. This thought flashes into the mind the moment I hear the phrase ‘it is made in a Burgundian style’.
Shell and I standing in a cellar door on the Mornington Peninsula. It is a cold, wet June in 2016. Having already visited the Yarra Valley the day before, Mornington was the next stop on our journey South in Victorian wine country. The region, with Tasmania the exception, consistently produces Australia’s better Pinot Noirs. We had just been taken through some reasonable Chardonnay and two Pinot Noirs, all fine, but unremarkable.
Sensing our lack of awe, we are presented with the Reserve Pinot Noir from under the counter. Our host looks quickly around the Cellar Door and whispers in a conspiratorial voice ‘this is our Reserve Pinot, it is not for tasting, it is made in the Burgundian style’, as she pours us each a small tasting. My heart sinks and I cringe at the comment. It is not the first time I have heard the comparison in the last few days, and it won’t be the last.
The absurdity of the claim requires clarification. Burgundy is a complex study, but a general understanding of the region illustrates the problem with any New World Pinot making the Burgundian comparison.
Burgundy is a long thin strip of vineyards in the Eastern-Central region of France. From Dijon in the North to Mâcon in the South. Governed by strict AOC (appellation d’origine contrôlée), the area is planted almost exclusively to Pinot Noir and Chardonnay.
The Burgundy wine region is broken into five distinct wine-growing regions, from North to South, Chablis, almost exclusively planted to Chardonnay, Côte de Nuits, Côte de Beaune, Côte Chalonnaise and finally Mâconnais in the South. Each of these wine regions expresses the Pinot grape in an entirely unique style.
If we narrow our study to the Côte D’or, we have the two regions of Côte de Nuits and Côte de Beaune. Here are the two primary producers of world-class Burgundy and where the comparison is often made. Consider there are five regions, all producing a different expression of Burgundy, and we have now narrowed our focus to two, we can further break these regions into communes.
Digging further, from Côte D’or, to Côte de Nuits, there are fourteen communes in the Côte de Nuits, each expressing its own unique version of Burgundy.
If we consider just the famous commune of Gevrey-Chambertin, there are 35 individual vineyards, not including the Villages (more on this later). Each vineyard expresses its own individual Burgundy profile.
Finally, a quick note on vineyard classification. Effectively, these vineyards are designated under the AOC, and represent the single-vineyard, or climat. These are Gran Cru, Premier Cru and Villages. Again, each expressing its own version of Burgundy.
It is a lot to consume, but consider for a moment the statement from the perspective of a wine grown in Australia, or any Pinot Noir not grown in Burgundy, ‘it is made in the Burgundian style’.
What could that possibly mean? If the Burgundy style varies from the vineyard, to commune to region so vastly, What style is the reference to? If a vineyard separated by meters in the same commune is different to the next, how could you make a reference to such a complex region to a single style?
You can’t.
A rustic Beaune Premier Cru is so far removed from a masculine powerful Gran Cru from Gevrey-Chambertin it almost a completely different wine. Likewise, cross the road from Gevrey to Chambolle, and you have elegant, feminine wines with incredible complexity. The variation in Burgundy is staggering.
 |
| Melbourne Burgundy Social Club (MBSC) Gran Cru Dinner, November 2016
The skeptics among us will question jus how much difference there can be between communes and vineyards. I was among these. When I first became interested in Burgundy I floated the idea of a regular get together with experienced Burgundy drinkers. The response was immediate, the numbers capped at nine. The Melbourne Burgundy Social Club was born.
Every two months, on a varied theme we would meet and taste wines blind. I was staggered at the accuracy of these experienced tasters. Regularly narrowing a wine to commune, occasionally to the vineyard. I was stunned at their accuracy. I learned more in those eighteen months than I have in twenty years of wine interest.
The picture above is Shell at an MBSC Gran Cru tasting. She is reluctant to admit it, but her nose and palate are superb. If I was correctly identifying commune half of the time, she managed to describe characteristics, describe the wine in detail, and hit the commune on a much more regular basis.
This is all for perspective on the original statement. If I can taste variation in communes from Burgundy, the term ‘made in a Burgundian style’, is utterly useless. Further, the comparison is always going to leave a taster disappointed. We honestly need to accept that Australian Pinot Noir, on average, will never reach the heady heights of Burgundy, while ever we frame in a Burgundian context.
Australian wine needs to stand on its own merits. Pinot or otherwise. While ever a New World Pinot claims it is Burgundian, it is doing an injustice to the vineyard terroir it represents. It is time for New World Pinot to put a flag in the sand and find its own style, its own personality.
The Burgundy shadow is long, while ever New World Pinot continues to compares itself to Burgundy, it will forever remain in the shade.
We drank this in July 2016.
I thought it best illustrated just how intriguing, yet individualistic Burgundy can be. It is sourced from 70-year-old vines from a tine vineyard, Aux Raviolles, in the Vosne-Romaneé comune. The vineyard is classified Villages.
2017 Domaine Jean Chauvenet Vosne-Romanée
Decanted for twenty minutes.
The wine is vibrant purple in the glass. Dark cherries dominate the nose. The wine is elegant, yet powerful. There is some licorice and plenty of wet forest floor in the background to create an intense, intriguing nose. On the palate, the wine is all texture and balance. Terrific mouthfeel, long integrated tannins supported by medium acid. A lovely wine yet to see its best drinking window.
Drink 2020-2030.
91 pts.
This wine was tasted blind and I picked it as Chambolle. While Vosne Romaneé certainly produces some of Burgundies’ most elegant wines, they usually possess more masculine power. Perhaps the Villages climat of the vineyard played a role. The elegance of this wine took me to Chambolle.
|