Breakfast in Burgundy, page 15
Gevrey appended Chambertin to add luster, and further confusion arose when vineyards contiguous with Chambertin had their names embellished by the addition of ‘Chambertin’ for the same reason. Thus we have the Chambertin clan. Gevrey was followed by other villages: Chambolle became Chambolle-Musigny, Vosne became Vosne-Romanée, and, further south, yet another layer of complexity was added when two villages pounced on the same prized vineyard to become Puligny-Montrachet and Chassagne-Montrachet. This was possible because the Montrachet vineyard straddles the boundary between the villages of Puligny and Chassagne. Still with me?
Burgundy’s vineyard classification is often likened to a pyramid, starting with the broad base of the general, region-wide appellations and ending with the premiers and grands crus, clearly demarcated vineyards celebrated in reputation if not always reality. The essence of the system is geographical delineation, and as you climb the pyramid this becomes ever more specific.
The village appellations of the Côte d’Or sit at mid-pyramid and anchor the system, a string of fabled names celebrated wherever wine is drunk. In common parlance these are referred to as “village” wines, though the official designation, “commune,” helps maintain the distinction between village as urban center and village encompassing adjacent vineyard land. Town land or parish convey the same meaning. The vinous boundaries between the villages or communes run through the vineyards, sometimes dividing them, as with Montrachet.
Whizz past on the RN74 or stop and stare—either way the Côte d’Or will look just like a vine-covered hillside. Where one vineyard ends and another begins may be marked by a wall or a track, but it also may not and the divide will be invisible to you. It will not be invisible to the local vignerons. Every scrap of vineyard has been differentiated and demarcated, to within an inch of its life, I like to say. From a few well-placed hectares a good living can be made, and it matters enormously whether they sit within or without this boundary or that. Here lie the favored premiers and grands crus plots. “Premier” translates as “first” and “grand” as “great,” so you can be forgiven for thinking that premier is best. Not so, les grands crus sit at the sharp end of the pyramid, and when English speakers express bafflement, a quick-witted Burgundian might ask: Which is the top court at Wimbledon, number one or center?
Burgundy, the wine, is defined and categorized by place, where it comes from rather than which grape it is made from, the traditional norm in Europe. Thus Gevrey-Chambertin is the name of a place and the name of a wine. Ditto Puligny-Montrachet. Outside of Europe, wine is usually defined by grape—Pinot Noir is a grape and a wine, as is Chardonnay—then origin. Poor old Chardonnay: a few years ago it morphed into a casual term for a style of wine—lavish fruit, lashings of oak, big and blowsy—leading to the contradiction where poorly informed, though astute, wine drinkers stated: “I don’t like Chardonnay, but I like white burgundy.” This prompted superior smirks from those in the know, because white burgundy is made from the grape Chardonnay, though it hardly qualifies as the wine style “Chardonnay.” To perplex the smirkers, I now state that I don’t like Chardonnay, but I love white burgundy. For the hell of it.
Hell is not a place I ever want to visit, but I drove past a vision of it on July 23, 2013. We were returning from Chagny with supplies for dinner, including a hunk of salty-pungent 36-month comté whose fragrance filled the car. We had been to Le Jardin d’Olivier, a gem of a shop owned by Joël’s brother Olivier, and temptation had got the better of prudence.
“Look!” said Fionnuala.
I glanced behind, expecting to see the comté taking its first steps.
“No, over there,” she said, pointing to the right.
A towering wall of cloud, inky-dark and frightening, was pouring devastation onto the vineyards. Hail, the winemaker’s worst nightmare. I nearly veered off the road.
“Someone is getting hammered over there. It looks like a different world.” I said.
“It’s the storm Joël predicted.”
“God knows what sort of damage it’ll do to the vines.”
“Let’s get home quick, I’ve a stack of washing on the line.”
“Over there” comprised the vineyards of Pommard, Volnay, and Savigny-lès-Beaune. We continued in sunny splendor while they suffered in purple-black purgatory, and got home minutes before the edge of the storm swept past. It had been a pressure-cooker day and now it exploded in fury. The wind howled and the rain lashed, but we escaped lightly; there was no hail. I knew what they were going through, for a year earlier a similar storm passed over our house. It ran to a Hitchcock script. The church bell chimed six and a sunny day turned dark, as if a pair of curtains closed. Then wind, then rain, then hail—hammering down with machine-gun ferocity—and then rain again, wind again, and sun again as the curtains opened and the bell chimed six-thirty.
The damage was bad then, but it was worse in 2013, and within minutes the twitter-sphere was alive with reports of devastation and pictures of lacerated vineyards and flooded roads. The next day I took a dawdling drive through Pommard and Volnay, over roads strewn with mud and stones sluiced out of the vineyards. From a distance all looked well, only when I stopped I saw the leaves stripped from the vines, the broken shoots, and the pummelled bunches of unripe grapes. Many of the tiny berries were split, rendering them useless for winemaking and posing the threat of rot for the remaining healthy ones. If a demented criminal had blazed away with a shotgun, it couldn’t have been worse. A fighter jet howled low overhead, banking this way and that. Inspecting the destruction also?
Hail is the grim reaper of winemaking, a savage enemy that strikes and is gone. It’s the monster that every winemaker fears, a scourge that can wipe out a year’s work in minutes. Everything else is just weather: rain and wind and sun. Rain waters the vines, a breeze dries it off, and sun ripens them. Hail is beyond weather; there’s no upside.
When all was said and done, after the 2013 storm some growers reported losses of 50, 60, and even 70 percent in some vineyards, near-disastrous levels. Cruelly, hail can ruin one vineyard while leaving its neighbor intact, and the localized nature of the damage, allied to the scattered landholdings of many winemakers, can mitigate its overall impact. I was reminded of this when I bumped into Benjamin Leroux, custodian of some of the finest vineyards in Pommard. With a wince I asked him about damage. It was light compared to others, he said, breathing a theatrical sigh of relief for emphasis.
Almost nothing can be done to protect against hail. Accurately predicting where it is going to fall is difficult. Netting is a possibility, as is cloud ‘seeding’ with silver iodide, but logistics and finances have ruled both out so far. Rockets used to be fired into clouds, more in hope than expectation. Dressing up as druids and sacrificing a goat on a hilltop would be more fun and probably as effective. The goat could be barbecued.
I continued my vineyard tramp, slowed by clods of mud on my shoes. It was mid-afternoon, sunny, and calm. A sleek black helicopter took off from the grounds of the Château de Pommard and swept away in a long arc. It didn’t have ‘corporate lunch’ stencilled on the side, but I consigned it to that pigeonhole anyway. I used to chase helicopters by bicycle, but now I remained anchored by mud.
It’s a mug’s game, but a few years ago I set off in pursuit of a helicopter that was spraying vineyards close to the village of Vougeot. It was early morning and I was searching for croissants when the whop-whop-whop drew me away. He was impossibly low, swooping, twisting, turning, climbing, diving, having fun. Here was a photo op too good to miss, so futile chase ensued. When I was here, he was there, and by the time I got there, he was here. If you’ve ever tried to swat a nimble fly on a hot summer’s day you will know the pink-gilled frustration I experienced that morning.
I climbed hills and scrambled along dirt tracks with thighs burning, camera in hand and an eye on the sky. He was some pilot, maneuvering the whirly-bird with acrobatic ease, searching out postage-stamp plots of steep vineyard before administering a dose of spray. I got shots of smudgy sky, and an index finger close-up, before nailing a speck-in-the-distance one of the chopper. All the plots to be sprayed were marked with plastic orange beacons, yet despite the skill of the pilot this practice is not very accurate and is being phased out.
Leaving off the chase I headed for home in Morey-Saint-Denis, where we holidayed for two years before we bought our house, not forgetting the croissants. A final burst on the pedals took me to the T-junction at Clos de Tart, the start/finish point for many early morning explorations.
I never set out with a fixed plan, but the adventure always began with an agonizing choice beneath the elaborate Clos de Tart sign: north towards Gevrey-Chambertin or south to Chambolle-Musigny and beyond? North began with a climb to the upper part of Morey followed by a freewheeling descent out of the village, past Clos-Saint-Denis and Clos-de-la-Roche on the left, over the boundary to Gevrey and along what I call ‘grands crus alley,’ home of the Chambertins. Latricières to the left, Mazoyères to the right, Chambertin to left, Charmes to right, Clos de Bèze to left, Griottes and Chapelle to right, Mazis and Ruchottes to left and then swing into the village along, you’ve guessed it, Rue du Chambertin.
The bicycle would then take a mind of its own, bringing me past restaurant Chez Guy to ignite memories of their signature dish: Noix de Joues de Boeuf cuites 12 Heures au Pinot Noir, carottes confites à la Cardamome. Beef cheek cooked for 12 hours and served in a single-portion casserole dish, en cocotte. Brilliant for dinner, perhaps not for breakfast.
The return was always slower, less exultant, and to avoid the rise into Morey I would circle wide to the left, along Rue de Très Girard and past the graveyard, stopping for a moment to marvel at its position—amongst the vineyards and within shouting distance of a good restaurant. In Burgundy they honor their dead in the best way imaginable—by according them pride of place among their vines. There they remain, eternal sentinels of vintage after vintage.
Each village has its own well-tended graveyard, often completely surrounded by vines, walled blocks of grey amongst green in summer. Like the vineyards there’s a uniformity to the graveyards, with small variations: Chambolle’s is a little outside the village on the tree-lined Rue du Tilleul while Puligny’s is tucked close to the village and boasts a tiny chapel, and Chassagne’s sits only a few hundred meters from Montrachet. Further south, change comes as the Côte d’Or tumbles to a halt and the Santenay graveyard reflects the altered geography. It is beautifully situated on a hillside above the thirteenth century chapel of Saint-Jean-de-Narosse: terraced, backed by forest, looking onto vine, and basking in the midday sun.
That’s as I saw it the day I went to pay my respects to the memory of Madame Beloeil, the previous owner of our house. Born in 1914, she passed away in August 2011 and her ashes were interred beside those of her husband on September 2. A straggle of mourners shuffled about, exchanging nods and handshakes. Muttered greetings faded to silence. Joël’s partner, Patricia, introduced me to Madame Beloeil’s son and grandchildren, who expressed grateful surprise at seeing me there.
We barely knew her but I was glad I went, for I still remember her delight when we presented her with a bottle of champagne after we agreed to buy the house. I bumbled through a short speech as I handed over the petit cadeau. She looked puzzled as I mangled her mother tongue, but I got the message across.
I try to leave the vineyard names un-mangled and make every effort to get their pronunciation correct, while also revelling in their meaning. Perhaps the most evocative is Meursault’s Goutte d’Or, a drop of gold. No wine better deserves this moniker than a heavenly Meursault, though fans of Chambolle-Musigny will counter that Les Amoureuses, the lovers, captures the beauty of red burgundy just as well. It’s not all cosy good fellowship down the road in Vosne-Romanée at the Malconsorts vineyard—these aren’t lovers; they’re bad consorts or companions, maybe even enemies. Dogs are on the loose in Chassagne-Montrachet and Saint-Aubin, homes respectively to Dent-de-Chien and Les Murgers-des-Dents-de-Chien. The former, tooth of the dog, is named for the shape of the vineyard or the sharp stones found in it, depending on who you listen to. The latter, the walls of dog’s teeth, sits above on the hill. We have drunk Dent-de-Chien and it carries no canine sharpness.
My favorite name is Sous-le-Dos-d’ne, below the donkey’s back. Perhaps it was named for Saint Vincent’s donkey? The correct explanation is more prosaic: the hill above the vineyard is shaped like a donkey’s back, though you’ll need to turbo-charge your imagination to see it. The vineyard sits on the Meursault side of the border with Puligny-Montrachet, affording the donkey a splendid view over a great sweep of fabulously expensive agricultural land.
Tooth of dog and back of donkey, star-crossed lovers and feuding companions, all leavened with a drop of gold, may read like the ingredients for a ghoulish drama, but at least these odd and charming names occur only once. Teeth-gnashing frustration occurs when the same name is scattered here and there, such as the Cailleret (little pebble) vineyards found in Volnay, Chassagne, and Puligny. Cailleret’s big brother is Perrières (stones) and these vineyards are sprinkled from north to south, from Gevrey to Puligny, Vougeot to Meursault, Nuits to Beaune.
Les Grandes-Ruchottes in Chassagne is not to be confused with Ruchottes-Chambertin in Gevrey, nor should La Romanée in Chassagne be taken for La Romanée in Vosne. And both of those Chassagne wines can be labelled as La Grande-Montagne. Pronunciation can be tricky too: for Chambertin say “Shom-bare-tahn,” for Musigny say “Mooze-een-yee,” for Meursault say “Muhr-soh,” for Échécheaux say “Esh-e-zoh,” for Richebourg say “Reesh-boorg,” and for Vougeot say “Voo-jhoe.” And if you remember that Epenots and Epeneaux both finish with an “oh,” you’ll be fine.
The complication in Burgundy’s vineyard map can be explained with one French word: terroir. Say “terr-wahr,” and you will sound convincing, but try explaining what it means and conviction will desert you. It does not simply mean the ground under your feet but includes the aspect of the land, the slope, the exposure, the micro-climate, the composition of the soil, the bedrock, and the drainage, all wrapped into a package that gives each identified patch of vines—“vineyard” is too grand a term—its own character.
Within one vineyard, nominally homogeneous, there can be a host of sub-plots, named patches of earth that yield a wine marginally different from its neighbors. The complicated pattern has evolved by way of one thousand years of intensive cultivation and study of the ground so that every dip and fold, every warp and weft in the hillside, every nuance of difference has been noted, categorized, and named. Conspiracy theorists, certain that this labyrinthine complication is the work of a crack team of bureaucrats, billeted in a secret Paris bunker, can only shake their heads in disappointment.
The bureaucrats came late to the game, drafting the Appellation d’Origin Controlée rules in the 1930s, and how they must have revelled in the task of carving the work of centuries into stone legalise. When trying to grasp the concept of terroir it helps to remember that this legal enshrinement, which can act as a block to understanding, is relatively recent. Terroir wasn’t imposed onto the land but rather discovered in it over a great span of time and only lately codified. It may seem baffling that the wines of two vineyards, separated by a thread of road, can be radically different, until it is realized that the road was probably laid to mark the difference.
Terroir sounds like a load of hokum until you taste a series of different wines from the same producer and vintage. Domaine Leflaive in Puligny-Montrachet is a celebrated producer of white wines, from basic Bourgogne blanc to lofty grand cru. As you move up the terroir ladder from the first, through village and premiers crus, to the last, every dimension of flavor is amplified. Depth: there’s greater richness and concentration; breadth: the wines become more mouth-filling and opulent; length: the flavor lingers longer and longer. This last is the ultimate test and in the case of the Chevalier-Montrachet the flavor goes on and on, reverberating in mouth and throat, etching itself into the memory before finally fading away.
The best winemakers modestly claim no great skill, asserting that they are mere midwives, vineyard custodians whose job is simply to release the potential of the land. The paradox is that the potential has to be harnessed before it can be released, and that is their job. Great wine requires more than terroir alone. The best vignerons work year round to produce great grapes and then make great wine from them. The slack ones revel in the good fortune of an inherited prime plot, happy to milk the name for all it is worth.
If one makes brilliant wine from this plot and their neighbor makes dull wine from the neighboring plot, with no significant change in terroir, then the difference is talent, not terroir. The winemaker’s hand matters. It’s like boeuf Bourguignon; ask 10 Burgundian chefs to cook you this classic with the same ingredients and you will end up with 10 similar but subtly different dishes.
It is when the doctrine of terroir is laid down like unchallengeable dogma that it begins to unravel, unwittingly helped by the modest winemakers who claim no special talent. Their excellent wines bring unwelcome attention to bear on those of the slackers, and those slackers’ wines constantly call into question the Burgundy sales pitch of terroir, terroir, terroir. It’s understandable that a promotional body, funded by a multiplicity of producers, will take this line, stressing the importance of vineyard rank above all else. Consumers, on the other hand, learn slowly that their buyers’ mantra must be producer, producer, producer. The most important thing to know when buying burgundy is who made the wine—until you know that all other information is irrelevant.
The sad thing is that you can spend a lot on a nominally prestigious bottle, only to discover it is thin and vapid, leaving you to conclude that this fiendish system has been put in place to baffle the consumer and protect the winemaker, who can hide behind the fence of terroir gobbledygook until another neophyte comes along for fleecing. It’s like selling shiny cars with rusty under-bodies. Good quality results when terroir and talent meet—both are essential—and when a great vintage occurs and the planets line up and God is having a good day we get the celestial wines that draw consumers back again and again in search of the holy grail, despite disappointments along the way.
