Using this flight as an example, I’d like to reflect on the evolution of wine, its balance, and its terroir‑driven character. Today, you can expect almost anything from white Burgundy: a reductive style, a rich and opulent expression, or even an oxidative‑reductive approach reminiscent of Jura. But a mineral, limestone‑driven profile has become much rarer, especially in Meursault.
Pierre Girardin clearly has a gift for winemaking: each of his white wines shows remarkable crystalline purity and an excellent sense of place. The result is a vivid, expressive bouquet without a focus on secondary oak‑derived notes, but rather on freshness and minerality, achieved through excellent acidity. His whites invariably recall the best Rieslings in this respect, and that is their special charm.
As for the reds from Éric Rousseau, the two wines were at very different stages of their development. Charmes 2007 is in its decadent phase, with plenty of that undergrowth character that Burgundian tasting notes call sous‑bois; the red berry fruit has moved into a dried spectrum, and the bouquet now lacks a bit of complexity. Even so, on the palate the wine was beautiful and long—this is a bottle for true evolution lovers, though for me it felt a touch more evolved than I would ideally like. Ruchottes, on the other hand, was phenomenally good: perfect maturity and, as a consequence, wonderful balance. Red forest berries, blood orange, hibiscus and spicy nuances; on the palate rounded and very long. Vintages 2007 and 2012 are similar in some ways, both producing wines with a delicate body and excellent acidity, yet even within a single domaine you can sense that they belong to different eras. Catching a wine in such a phase is about as interesting as it gets.
We finished with a Coteaux Champenois from Jérôme Coessens, but this was a completely different, more “natural” style. A very good wine, yet fundamentally of another school, even if very enjoyable. Can you really feel terroir in it? For me, no. Can you still take pleasure from it? Yes, absolutely.
Text and Photo: Greg Somm
