Wine Weekend Paris - Tastings

We started tasting at Ravaut, a great producer of Burgundies, favored by the Chef Cousin and a domain I have visited a couple of times. The Chef Cousin has always said that Ravaut wines are prime examples of the Golden Ratio. Good wine is not just price - high or low - nor is it only about age or taste, but I think it is about the balance of price and quality. Anyway, Ravaut is a typical Burgundy domain – family owned and operated from what resembles more a 60’s farmhouse than a chateau, proprietors of small parts of named fields (climats or parcelles) that are not contiguous and passionate for their production. We had been joined by Boulanger, one of Chef Cousin’s suppliers, and the four of us tasted some excellent 2005's (reds) and 2006's (whites). Note: in Burgundy, traditionally, red wine is not bottled for almost 18 months after the harvest; white wine is bottled sooner.

In reality we tasted about 12 wines – 5 or so whites and 7 reds. The whites included a 2006 and a 2005 Corton Charlemagne Grand Cru which is so named, according to legend, because Charlemagne loved wine and asked the Burgundy winemakers to produce a white suitable for a king that would not stain his long blond beard when it trickled out the corners of his mouth! Among the red wines we tasted were some very distinct ones. Remember that 99% of red Burgundy is made from one grape, the Pinot Noir, and is not blended like Bordeaux or many other great wines. As a result, it is always fascinating to taste reds produced by the same winemaker, all from grapes grown, in Ravaut’s case, in lower Côtes de Nuits and upper Côtes de Beaune (geographic areas as close as Chelsea and Greenwich Village in Manhattan) that are so dramatically different.

We had a ‘flight’ of Ladoix, Premier Crus and Villages, from different parcelles, and compared these to two Aloxe-Corton – one a Premier Cru, one not. Now in Burgundy, there are a number of distinctions in the labeling for wine, red and white, and controls on where the grapes are grown for different wines. The authorities that control produce named for regions or AOC’s (Appellation d’Origine Contrôlée), have granted several AOC’s in Burgundy. The basic white or red can be labeled Bourgogne Blanc or Bourgogne Pinot Noir – regional wines that can be made from grapes grown in Burgundy. Above that are wines labeled Bourgogne Aligoté or Côte de Nuits Villages – wines made from grapes grown in a certain area but harvested from any variety of vineyards. Next in the pecking order are the Appellation Villages or Communales made from grapes grown within the borders of a village. These include well known wines like Chablis and Pommard and less well known such as Irancy and Rully. Within the Village wines there is another distinction – Premier Cru – awarded to certain parcelles and therefore the wines produced from these fields carry that moniker. The highest level is Grand Cru, granted to a limited number of parcelles and attached to a Village name – Chablis Grand Cru or Corton Grand Cru – but generally wines carrying this label are catalogued separately from other wines from the same Village. Grand and Premier Cru wines are produced from both Pinot Noir or Chardonnay grapes (the latter is the grape used in the majority of white Burgundies) grown in delimited fields, and the authorities also control annual quantities produced under the different AOC’s.

So, racing back to the tasting, in the ‘flight’ we had a Ladoix (a Village wine made from Pinot Noir grapes grown anywhere inside this appellation), a Ladoix Les Carrières (again a Village but made from grapes grown inside the parcelle, ‘Les Carrières’), a Ladoix Clos Royer (likewise, but a Clos is a fenced field), and three Ladoix 1er Cru, all from different parcelles. Now, remember that the Village appellation is not much bigger than a couple of city blocks, the parcelles are small named fields inside that appellation and the Premier Cru parcelles are a few of the named fields (often at the top of the hill or with a different exposure than the others because it is believed that vines that ‘suffer’ – less water or nutrients – make better wine; rather like suffering for fashion – the pointier the shoe, the more painful to the toes but the more stunning). Each of the Ladoix was as individual as cousins in a family by which I mean that there was a common thread of taste but several were more tannic, one or two more supple, one more filled with ripe red fruit, etc. It was a revelation and clarified for me a reason to visit this type of tasting – sorting out which tastes one prefers within an appellation of wine.

Next we tried two different Aloxe-Corton, one a Premier Cru. Now this is described by most as a feminine wine – delicate, smooth and elegant – and when the Personal Historian was in Paris recently, we ordered a '99 at Chez Julian. It followed an excellent 2000 Rully 1er Cru (white), and I thought the Aloxe was light but fine until the Personal Historian ordered a glass of Gevrey-Chambertin with dessert. Upon tasting that, I thought I had been drinking water with red food coloring. Now to be fair, a great Gevrey could be called a steamroller when compared to a decent Aloxe, or as the Prince Consort would say, “Un a rien a faire avec le autre” or something like that. Nevertheless, I swore off Aloxe and it was with less than enthusiasm that I tasted Ravaut’s. Well, what a pleasant surprise! Worth drinking, worth buying, and most of all, another reason to visit tastings – sorting out which domain produces wine that you appreciate.