Two wines I bought in Lyon.
So you've got a very small domaine in Marsannay. A village with no Premier Crus. All the parcels are in the village proper and you need to make a Bourgogne for commercial reasons. Time and again, in similar situations, the end result is a village wine in regional clothing and price. In this case, the deal is made sweeter by 60+ year old vines.
Marsannay is one of the northernmost points in the Cote d'Or, and in my experience the wines need more time to open than you’d expect from village and regional wines. With air, I get black raspberries, dark earthy notes, echoed on the palate, where they engulf a sweeter core. Lovely. Were this available in Israel, I would have aged it a few more bottles. This should definitely be treated as a village wine and given a couple more years in the fridge, at least.
Yann Bertrand, Fleurie, Coup de Foudre, 2019
Beaujolais is a region that attracts young Turks, vignerons attentive to the land and vines, heedful of tradition while not accepting it in blind faith. Yann Betrand comes from a family of Fleurie vignerons, but his inspiration to become a winemaker himself came while living in the Alps, where he met passionate wine lovers and winemakers. True love travels on a gravel road. In the Alps.
The Bertrands had been making wine for generations in the traditional Beaujolais technique of cold carbonic whole cluster fermentations, with minimal or no SO2, and had started moving towards organic viticulture two decades before Yann took over. Yann pushed things towards biodynamism. When I read the family's professional background, I find myself wondering, where do the old ways end and the new begin? Were the parents the original neo-traditionalists in the family? Since I have no way of finding out, let’s just move on to the wine.
I read up the wine's technical sheets. The grapes comes from plots rich in sandy granitic soil, the vines are 50 to 70 year old and the wine is aged in 7+ year old barrels. I've read similar sheets many times and often such wines are very good and interesting. Wines where you notice the winemaker's personal touch, and where that touch does not detract from the fruit and the sense of origin - that's much rarer.
The impact of the first couple of glasses was similar to what I felt when I discovered legendary Morgan producer Jean-Paul Thevenet a decade ago - excitement! The fruit is fresh and balanced, pure and clean, earthy, without a hint of dirt (on the other hand, I do initially get a light fizz from trapped CO2), showing lovely, gently spiciness over scented strawberries. The acidity is lovely, the finish slightly rusty - while the tannins are already integrated to the point of feeling non-existent. Thevenet's wines were structured the same way: structure and tension carried by the fruit and acidity, with minimal tannins. But Thevenet's magic was often like a magical city in a fable, vanishing at the first rays of dawn. Maybe they just don't travel well. Some bottles were off. Some faded away. But they were taut and exciting at their best.
There’s magic here, too, one that I need to reconcile with the fact that the bottle faded after a while. But the thrill of discovery, the way this wine wins me over with a vivid sense of character and life - they are enough for me to recognize Yann Bertrand's skills and sensitive touch.
I hate to say it, but unless and until winemakers like Bertrand and Thevenet find a middle ground vis a vis use of sulfur, this kind of magic is probably best experienced in Beaujolais.
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