Great Wine Made Simple - Andrea Immer [66]
Grand Cru This is the top of the line and, as in Alsace, roughly translates as “top-class vineyard.” There are thirty-two vineyards so ranked in Burgundy’s main district, the Côte d’Or (read on for more on this). Examples include Clos de Vougeot (Cloe duh Voo-JHOE), usually a red, and Le Montrachet (Luh Mohn-rah-SHAY), a white.
What does all this mean? It is just like the real estate market: The most exclusive addresses cost the most. In the Burgundian equivalent, wines from the best vineyard sites are the most expensive, due both to quality potential and to supply and demand. As you move up the ranks, from the general rank for the whole region, to the top class for just thirty-two individual vineyards (in the main Burgundy district), the quantity of wine available goes down as the quality potential goes up. What makes one vineyard site better than another? Above all, it is location, the best spots being those that get the most sun. Generally, these are the east-facing slopes, which get the first morning sun, and thus have maximum ripening potential. Specifically, they are often at the slope’s middle part, with the best drainage and soil.
To help this make sense, consider the layout of a side of beef. The meat for your hamburger represents the most generic of beef “real estate.” The filet mignon, or tenderloin, is the most specific, finest, and most limited, as reflected in the price—generic to grand cru, so to speak. Then there are short rib, sirloin, and all the other cuts in between, each with varied quantity and quality potential, and also a different flavor style, depending on their location. Burgundy is similar, as our next point will show.
FLAVOR STYLES Burgundy’s flavor styles vary according to the “neighborhood” (vineyard area). Now we are talking not status but the personality of each vineyard area. As shown on the Major Wine Regions of Burgundy map, there are five such vineyard areas, or subdistricts—the Côte d’Or (Coat DOOR), Chablis, the Côte Chalonnaise (Coat Sha-luh-NEZZ), the Mâconnais (Mah-coh-NAY), and Beaujolais—whose wines vary quite a bit from one to the next. Most people find this amazing considering how small the growing areas are. For instance, the most famous section of Burgundy, called the Côte d’Or, is just thirty miles long—easily biked in a leisurely afternoon, to the joy of its many visitors.
It’s pretty neat how all this variation happened. I have a Master Sommelier friend who studied geology and maintains a zeal for it equal to his passion for wine. He explains that over the passing of millennia, successive geologic layers have been stacked one on top of the other, creating a kind of giant layer cake of different soils. During tectonic shifts of the earth’s crust, the Alps to the northeast and the Pyrenees to the southwest of Burgundy rose up and cut this cake, serving up a neat slice with the different layers laid bare at the earth’s surface. That is the Burgundy vineyard—just two grapes, yes, but every layer, every variation of soil type, gives wines with a slightly different character. Lovers of Burgundy might tell you that they feel the earth move when tasting and comparing their favorite appellations, because at their best, these wines can be among the most seductive in the world.
Wine Types
In teaching waiters about Burgundy, I have found that it is easiest to understand if you divide the wines into two groups—the classics and the rest—according to the subdistrict of Burgundy from which they come. As you will see, these two groups dovetail nicely with the appellation and vineyard ranking system we covered above.
THE CLASSICS Burgundy’s classic wines come from two areas within the whole—the Côte d’Or and Chablis. They are the classic areas because they are home to most of the top-ranked appellations of Burgundy—the Premier and Grand Cru ranked vineyards. Côte d’Or translates as “golden slope,” a reference to the east-facing slope at its heart, where all the best