2023 Burgundy was a bounteous but heterogenous vintage in which the white wines outshone the reds after a growing season that was marked by periods of intense heat, says Sarah Marsh MW.
2023 Burgundy: A guide to the villages and vineyards
Mother Nature bestowed an abundant crop of Pinot Noir on the Côte d’Or, but as those who love this fickle grape variety are aware, quality and quantity are not synonymous. It is not an easy red vintage to define, because it is heterogeneous in terms of both quality and style. I generally prefer white Burgundy in 2023. The crop was bounteous, but not extravagant, although the wines can be. As Chardonnay is not especially yield-sensitive, quality was higher and more consistent. Style was determined by the degree of ripeness, which evolved rapidly as the vines sweltered in temperatures as high as 38ºC (100ºF). Sugar escalated and acidity plummeted, while pickers took shelter in the afternoons from the heatwave during Burgundy’s hottest harvest on record.
Style
2023 Burgundy Whites
Overall, 2023 Burgundy is an engaging vintage for white wines, which are ripe, supple, juicy, and medium-full. Over the course of ten days in early September, the aromatics and fruit flavors evolved from citrus, through white peach and golden, to tropical. This heatwave affected the alcohol levels, body, richness, and acidity, although less so than might have been expected, since the relatively generous crop saved the vintage from excessive concentration, in contrast to the lower-yielding 2019, when the change in the composition and structure of the fruit during the harvest was more pronounced.
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A minority of whites are lean and green, harvested too early, but there are many more at the other extreme—glossy and exotic, with 14.5% ABV. The more opulent wines have time to improve, to tighten up and slim down, over another winter. Not all producers, though, benefit from this extended élevage, so look out for those who do in the introduction to each domaine.
Even when the 2023 whites are opulent, they are seldom heavy. The palate is normally brighter and firmer than the analysis would suggest, perhaps because more producers this year crushed the grapes before pressing, enhancing the tannic structure and offsetting the ripe fruit and high alcohol levels. The wines are generally well-balanced and many have surprisingly good tension.
There is frequently a sensation of sweetness on the finish, and some cuvées struggled to finish the fermentation. At bottling, whites should have less than 2g/l of sugar, but it’s a somewhat gray area. Moreover, the hot weather burned off much of the malic acidity, making this another largely mono-acid vintage—and tartaric acid has a certain sweetness.
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2023 Burgundy reds
It is an affable vintage for reds, with plentiful ripe and juicy fruit. After just a year in barrel, the reds were already accessible and largely in place. They are generally medium-bodied in style with modest to fair intensity. Most are around 13–13.5% ABV on the Côte de Nuits, although some are 14% plus, albeit more often on the Côte de Beaune. In any domaine’s portfolio, however, there are often one or two cuvées of at least 14%. This is easy to explain, in that the vintage turned on a sixpence, from underripe to headily overripe, a transformation more apparent in reds than in whites. It is also evident in the whites, but Chardonnay handles higher alcohol and opulence more comfortably.
It is a fruit-driven vintage, the character ranging from bright morello cherry, through ripe, soft summer fruits, into baked cherry, sometimes slightly singed. There are black fruits, too—sweet black cherry and chocolate in some Pommard for example. In Gevrey-Chambertin, I encountered blackcurrant, with a cassis-like sweetness. Where I mention forest fruit, I mean that it is fresher, livelier, and more floral.
Although the fruit is splashy, I would say that at least one third of the red wines I tried are overripe, while another third are on the cusp—often exotically aromatic, with pink and purple extravagance, and for my palate, cooked, musky, and cloying. Sometimes there is an undertow of something feral. It is a rather baked vintage, and some of the wines lack purity. It was lovely to hit pristine, singing wines, which are certainly there, but in the minority.
As with the white wines, there is often an impression of sweetness on the finish, from quite jammy fruit. You don’t often sense a sweetness to the finish in the Côte de Nuits, but it is present in 2023. Sometimes sweetness and sweet acidity combine—probably when the acidity has been tweaked. From limestone soils there are wines that can taste both salty and sweet, which is attractive.
The best Côte de Beaune 2023s lean into the softer, juicy, and charming expression of this half of the Côte d’Or, with summer fruits and smooth tannins, even in Pommard. Some climats—Beaune has several culprits, and Volnay a few—can be too loose, slack, and soft. Generally, yields were lower in the Côte de Beaune, which has produced more concentrated wines heading to 14% ABV and above. Even where the analysis was similar to that in the Côte de Nuits, the alcohol seemed higher in the Côte de Beaune, and the acidity softer. Many producers in the Côte de Beaune commented on the thick skins at harvest, and there are wines with rustic tannins, where you sense fruit that was picked before optimal phenolic ripeness—probably because it was dehydrating.
Tasting through the Côte de Nuits, I started so many of my notes with “ripe, generous, and juicy fruit,” then wondered what came next—sometimes, not a lot, in fruity wines that lacked intensity as there had been just too much juice in the grapes. Happily, however, there are also wines with decent substance and depth.
The tannins are generally on the gentle side, light and fine-grained, ambling hand-in-hand with the soft acidity. This is not a vintage for grippy or robust tannin on the Côte de Nuits; be they crunchy or smooth, they are pleasant, quite light, and have integrated swiftly into the wine. Indeed, many wines have remarkably light tannins for the Côte de Nuits, and with their lowish acidity, they can seem to lack structure, although on the positive side, they are easily accessible.
Some are just about fresh enough, while others are quite lively. Where the acidity was a little low, it was sometimes tweaked, and the same can be said for the sugar—although not, we would hope and trust, in the same wine. I often found myself writing about wines that seemed to glide or slide across the palate. There is a relaxed feel to this vintage, but also a certain lack of dynamism.
Wines from deep, rich climats, which are usually upfront and muscular, are more demure and polite in 2023. From white stony soils, there is there is only mild austerity; a playful crackle and crunch. There is no crack of the whip in 2023.
In short, there is a clear difference between the two halves of the Côte d’Or. In the Côte de Beaune, the reds are generally more concentrated and higher in alcohol, no doubt due to the lower yields, but there are also wines with green and rustic tannins. In the Côte de Nuits, the heatwave helped to ripen the larger crop load, but here far more wines lack substance.
Vintages to compare and contrast with 2023 Burgundy
Whites
The 2023 Burgundy whites are not unlike the 2022s, but with a little less acidity, depth, and structure. Alternatively, they are somewhat like 2017, with more alcohol and body but less acidity; some producers insist that 2023 has more acidity, though I am seldom persuaded. The wines that feel sweet on the finish remind me of 2019, but with less acidity and less concentration. For an older vintage, maybe 2009? Some wines were already in bottle or being prepared for bottling before the end of 2024. But patience will pay dividends. Those that will have a second winter before bottling—especially when it is spent in stainless steel—will sharpen, drop in pH a little and, with a final polish, will not be far off the style of 2022, just not as concentrated.
Ben Leroux envisages them becoming more like 2022, while Guillaume Lavollée at Domaine Génot-Boulanger considers them as being like 2022 now and destined to evolve in the direction of 2018. Charles Boillot thinks they have “less acidity and more sugar than 2022, which is the better vintage for keeping. Maybe they are quite like 2006, but with more freshness, so probably closer to 2009.”
“We had the ripeness with especially high yields. Riper than 2009. Exceptional in this respect. I can compare with 1982 whites for their generosity,” remarks Celine Fontaine. Bruno Colin declares, “It is such a fruity vintage. I don’t have another vintage with this balance of freshness. Maybe it’s like 2017, but a bit richer.” Frédéric Weber at Bouchard Père & Fils seems to agree: “The whites have the generosity and purity of 2017, which is ripe but with fine acidity, although 2023 has more dry extract.” Romaric Chavy comments, “For a warm vintage, the whites have preserved their freshness well, so it is a little like 2017 but with less intensity.” Brian Sieve at Domaine de Montille has changed his mind about the aptness of the 2017 comparison: “2023 is now like 2019 for whites, but in barrel they were showing more like 2017.”
Reds
On the Côte de Beaune, the red-fruited, softer, sweeter wines resemble 2017, with some of the ripeness of 2015, but without the caliber of that earlier vintage. The darker, more tannic wines are much closer to 2018. That year, the yields were high and the analyses similar, but the reds were generally more Port-like—higher in alcohol, with black, plummy fruit, while the thick-skinned and sometimes sunburned berries gave more rustic tannins. There is certainly an element of this in 2023, but generally there are lighter and softer tannins than in 2018.
Nadine Gublin, who has been making the wine at Jacques Prieur for 33 years, finds that the Côte de Beaune resembles 2018, while the Côte de Nuits is closer to 2017, but with more concentration.
On the Côte de Nuits, I agree that the best comparison, at least for now, is 2017—another very fruity Pinot vintage of modest substance. But there is a crucial difference: 2023 often has exotic aromas and baked fruit, while 2017 shows purer red fruit and more charm. Unlike the Côte de Beaune, there’s no comparison with 2015, which is fresher and more firmly structured. Testing this at Méo-Camuzet, the 2015 Corton Rognet had more freshness, depth of fruit, and richness of tannin than the 2023.
Contrasting recent warm vintages on the Côte de Nuits, 2023 has lower concentration than 2019 or 2020, and lower acidity than 2020 or 2022. Nobody mentioned 2020 as a comparison—quite rightly. The acidity and tannins are not locked in active combat as they were in 2020, which was among the characteristics that generated excitement then. No such thrills in 2023.
I find little in common with the concentrated 2019 vintage, except the sweetness, although some do. Alec Seysses perceives 2023 to be “closest to 2019, for ripe and silky tannins, but 2019 was a much smaller crop, so has a different degree of concentration.”
Arthur Clair compares 2023 Burgundy with “2017 for brightness, and 2015 for richness,” which is a fair call for Marsannay. Christophe Roumier finds them like a stronger 2017 or a less alcoholic 2018.” Brian Sieve remarks, “The reds are bright, fresh, and energetic, like 2017. If 2023 can be as good as 2017, I will be laughing.”
Considering older vintages, many compare 2023 with 1999, mainly because of the yields. 1999 was also a fruity vintage sometimes lacking in concentration. As Jacques Devauges at Clos des Lambrays observes, “In general, it is a very accessible vintage due to the level of ripeness—sometimes too ripe in some places. As for aging potential, well that depends on the vigneron; some will not have the concentration. Like 1999, you feel the dilution, and there will be some of that in some 2023s.”
Perhaps it’s more like 2000 for the sweet, jammy fruit and low tannin on the Côte de Nuits, but the best 2023s are better than the best 2000s. I tried a few older vintages at Faiveley, where the 2000 Clos de Corton showed a generosity and sweetness not so very different from those of the 2023. There was no comparison between the 1998 and the 2023 Cazetiers, as the quality and style have changed so radically in the interim, though to a greater or lesser extent that would also be true of many other domaines. As Christophe Perrot-Minot comments, “We are making the references for the future now.”
Comparing vintages is rather fun, but more difficult for 2023 than for most. As Louis-Michel Liger-Belair points out, “Stylistically, 2023 is variable, while 2022 and 2024 are much more consistent.”
2023 Burgundy quality
Many producers tell me that 2023 Burgundy is turning out better than they expected, and that it continues to improve, the whites becoming more refined and the Côte de Nuits reds gaining in structure.
In my book, 2023 is better for whites—from Chablis, to Pouilly-Fuissé, not forgetting the very attractive whites from the Côte de Nuits—than it is for reds. Most whites might be described as medium-plus (B-minus) in quality—a notch below the perfectly pleasant 2022s.
For the reds, 2023 Burgundy is an in-between vintage—similar to 2017 in this respect, but there is a greater qualitative range in 2023, from pedestrian, to fine. In fact, it is among the most inconsistent red wine vintages, in terms of quality and style, that I have reviewed. Among the best wines are Christophe Roumier’s. He comments, “The 2023 wines are shining. A little bigger than 2022, with lots of delicacy and complexity.”
It is possible, however, to find ripe but dilute Pinot Noir across the Côte de Nuits. The worst offenders at village level were Gevrey-Chambertin, followed by Nuits-St-Georges, with Vosne-Romanée not far behind, although Nuits-St-Georges had the highest number of uninteresting premier cru wines. Even at individual domaines, there are inconstancies and extremes. At one domaine, I was presented with four village wines that were dilute and tasted pretty much the same, after which quality picked up, but some wines were massive and overblown. In a nutshell: inconsistent!
As every producer will tell you, yields were key to quality in 2023 reds—but what does that really mean? For this vintage, 40hl/ha is low—sounds good to importers, wine writers, and customers, but this may bear little relation to the quantity of fruit the vine was carrying and trying to ripen, which could be the equivalent of 60 or even 80hl/ha. Some halved their crop on the sorting table, making a positive selection of the best fruit, rather than merely throwing out the bad stuff, which is the normal approach. After days of listening to people tell me their yields, while tasting some wines at 40hl/ha that were quite dilute, and others at 55hl/ha that were more concentrated, it was evident that hl/ha was not an accurate reflection of the crop or the concentration of juice in the berry. Some, including Frédéric Mugnier and De Montille, used a saignée to concentrate the juice-to-skin ratio before fermentation. Others simply took largely free-run wine, maxing out on the permitted yields with no or little press. Anything over the limit goes for distillation.
Given the crop load for reds, it’s not surprising that they lack the density of a really fine vintage. Moreover, there was a sudden race to ripeness, rather than a long, slow ripening through September, which is the ideal scenario for intensity and complexity. They are very charming Pinot Noir, but for the top-end premier and grand cru wines, I was often left wanting more focus and intensity. A top-quality wine must show layers—lots of them—and then push into a really long finish. I come across layers all too seldom, even in some wines with an exceptional finish.
Jérôme Flous at Faiveley feels the 2023 will be well-received, especially in some markets. “The market loves perfumed, elegant, lighter wines—especially the UK, Asia, and Canada—while the USA and France like wines with body and structure.”
There were two producers among those I visited who considered the vintage to be of the finest quality: Denis Bachelet, who found the quality and quantity “outstanding,” and Anne Gros, who remarked, “It the best quantity of my life, with quality that is superb.”
Considering reds, I can’t say that one Côte is better than the other, but I can say my favorite villages are Marsannay, Morey, Chambolle, and Pommard.
But if I am brutally honest, I wouldn’t put many, if any, 2023 Burgundy reds in my cellar. There is an aromatic character in two thirds of the red wines I tasted that I just don’t like, but that’s my sensitivity.
I could cherry-pick a few wines, but feel that Burgundy from the top villages, of the Côte de Nuits in particular, have become too expensive. It’s challenging to justify the prices in any vintage, and this is not a battle I would fight for 2023. Frédéric Mugnier expresses his concern. “I am a guardian of tradition, but I hope I do not become a custodian of a museum.”
While top producers have customers queuing, one wonders how the market for négociants’ wines can be sustained. With the high cost of fruit, whatever the quality, it’s virtually impossible for a négociant to be competitive with domaines, given that the wines are more expensive to produce. Dujac, among the first to offer négoce wine as an introduction to their domaine, are drawing back on this activity from 2024. “It’s no longer possible to offer good value,” explains Jeremy Seysses.
This is a drinking vintage for reds. Better to concentrate on unpretentious wines. I recommend wines from Marsannay and maybe Fixin. It’s a good year for the Hautes-Côtes in both colors. The higher altitude vineyards afforded the opportunity to hang the reds a little longer while the skins ripened, without the dramatic effect on pH and sugar felt in the regional vineyards below the villages of the Côte d’Or. The Hautes-Côtes whites also held onto their acidity, producing fresher whites than Bourgogne from vineyards on the plain.
But if you feel you must have top grand cru reds in your collection, you will find some stellar wines in the tasting notes. Frankly, though, you should have snaffled 2020s if you wanted a brilliant vintage for longevity and overall excellence. Moreover, the charming 2022 vintage in the Côte de Nuits is better than 2023, although some producers may try to persuade you to the contrary.
Aging capacity and when to drink
There’s not much to choose between reds and whites for when to start opening them. If anything, I would wait longer for the whites: village wines from soon after bottling, lesser premiers crus from 2026/27, and top whites from early 2028.
Whites are cleaner than reds, and for this reason alone, whites are a safer bet for aging, and they generally have better balance, so are more likely to reward patience. But increasingly, I prefer mature whites to reds. A balance of fruit and maturity is best, and on that basis the upper-end premier cru and grand cru whites will be drinking well from 2029–34—from six to ten years—but will no doubt continue longer.
The reds on both Côtes are equally approachable. The pHs are high; there is little tension between the acidity and tannin, and nothing to resolve, except some oak to digest. I don’t envisage much bottle shock. A year in bottle for the village wines, so early 2026, and a couple of years for the top premiers crus (from late 2027), but even most of these will be perfectly happy opened with a year in bottle. From late 2027 into 2028 for the grands crus, though they will of course last longer.
This may seem premature, but consider this an early vintage in all respects: an early harvest, an early malolactic for most, and, for some, an early bottling. The wines are accessible. Increasingly, I prefer youthful fruit in reds and wouldn’t hesitate to open them. The 2020s demand aging and will reward those who keep them. 2018s are drinking well now. Give 2019 another year, although most of those are also coming around. The light 2021 vintage is accessible. Drink 2023 before 2022. You don’t have to wait 20 years for these recent vintages. I am still waiting for some 2005 reds, which is absurd, really.
And for those who prefer mature red Burgundy, I would sound a cautionary note. The high pH and lower acidity bring aging capacity into doubt, especially when combined with modest substance, less-than-perfect health, and elevated volatile acidity. I have no doubts about 2022, which was a better balanced vintage and, crucially, a super-clean, healthy vintage, but I would be concerned about deviation in the 2023s. So, maybe eight to ten years for the premiers crus, ten to 15 for the top wines, but I think this is a vintage in which to enjoy the fruity expression.
Frédéric Mugnier feels the weight of responsibility. “I can’t guarantee the wine will be perfect. I do my best. In the past, people would buy a case of six or 12 bottles and open them over the years, but now they just have one bottle.”
Terroir and typicit
Terroir definition is more precise for whites than for reds—a good vintage for whites in this respect, although they can lose definition with high alcohol, particularly from more modest terroirs.
Where the red wines are dilute, so is the terroir expression. The grands crus and the best of the premiers crus shine through with distinctive character, although to capture a clear expression of a warm terroir—an exposed site such as Cazetiers—it was paramount to pick in good time, while in cooler areas—climats such as Combe de Lavaux, Combe Grisard, Combe d’Orveau—there was more latitude.
Below this level, the image of the terroir is much less precise. Village lieux-dits and lesser premiers crus, unless they have a very strong identity, are hazy. This situation maintains the hierarchy. In recent vintages, some wines have outperformed their appellation status, and low-profile villages have leapt into the limelight, but this is not really the case in 2023.
2023 Burgundy in the vineyard
Season
“The warmest season in history for Burgundy globally. Dry and warm, wetter and warmer than 2022 or 2020, but with less light and sun light,” remarks Frédéric Weber at Bouchard.
After a dry winter, the water table was low, but with a mild and wettish spring, vine growth was rapid. A strict debudding was important, though no one at the time realized how significant this would be. As Louis-Michel Liger-Belair points out, “After the small crops in 2019 and 2021, there is some tendency to leave more buds as insurance against frost, but we are strict from day one.”
“Strict debudding in May, leaving seven or eight buds evenly spaced along the cane, so the fruit will not crowd,” remarks Claude Josset, “is the best way to avoid disease.” To do this thoroughly, Chandon de Briailles employs one person per hectare.
In June, the flowering went well, although as Frédéric Weber recalls, “There was high storm activity in June and July, so the vines didn’t suffer from drought, but we had pressure from oidium.” In the wake of the problematic 2024 season, most producers considered it easy to manage the vineyards in 2023. It was clearly important to stay on top of the spraying. In June 2023, I recall the vignerons being out in force. There was too much sulfur in the air to want to cycle. At Chandon de Briailles, they find skimmed milk sufficient to keep oidium in check if the outbreak is as mild as it was in 2023.
There was a severe, but localized, hail storm on July 11. Meursault premier cru and village parcels and Volnay suffered losses of 35–40% in some climats. Charles Boillot’s vineyards were struck, but he comments that the effect was very different from 2014, when the vine stopped functioning for a couple of weeks to recover. In 2023, the hail stones were large and sliced off whole bunches, but the vine structure was undamaged.
Green-harvesting and yields
In July, producers began green-harvesting, principally on Pinot Noir. “We had huge bunches of Pinot Noir, the largest I have ever seen, larger even than in 1999, although in 2023 the large bunches were mainly Pinot Noir,” recalls Frederic Weber. “In July, I employed 40 people for green-harvesting, sometimes halving the crop and pulling leaves.”
Denis Bachelet, who cropped Pinot Noir at an average of 50hl/ha, observed that he had not seen such yields since 1999 or 1982, and he was not alone. Jérôme Flous points out that at Faiveley they discarded more bunches in 2023—the equivalent of 30hl/ha—than they harvested in 2024, when yields were 15hl/ha in some places.
At Domaine des Lambrays, Jacques Devauges expresses the sentiment of many. “I do not like to make a green-harvest, but even with it, we had 35% more crop than normal. It was a key point, even if you had done everything correctly in the vineyard. Sometimes, Mother Nature gives you an over-abundant crop.”
Some—among them Morey producers Jérôme Castagnier and Cyprian Arlaud—made more than one pass through the vineyard. Charles Magnien did a green-harvest in July and removed underripe bunches in late August… and still had 50hl/ha. Alec Seysses tells me they are not as fanatical as they were 20 years ago about green-harvesting, when it was frequently difficult to ripen fruit: “Not like in 2005, checking that there are only seven bunches per vine. We just took off fruit when we saw the vine was overburdened.” Christophe Perrot-Minot remarks, “You could leave ten bunches on the old vines, because the bunches were small.” By no means everyone did a green-harvest. Thibault Liger-Belair and Frédéric Mugnier were among those who did not.
Given the crop load, most villages applied to the Confédération des Appellations et des Vignerons de Bourgogne (CAVB) in Beaune for an authorized increase in yields (a Volume Complémentaire Individuel, VCI)—not just for village wines, but for premiers and some grands cru as well. It’s also possible to apply for a Volume Substitutable Individuel (VSI), which permits producers to sell more bottles if swapped with a volume of bottles authorized, but unsold, from a previous vintage.
White villages followed suit, although many with older Chardonnay vines had only moderate crops. “I have a lot of old vineyards. Everyone said there was a lot of wine in 2023, but not for us,” says Bruno Colin. “We have made less wine in 2023 than in 2022—about 53hl/ha for our old vines, which is enough and good for us.” This was also the case for some producers with older Pinot Noir vines, who found that they were more stable in the heatwave, lower-yielding, with less dramatic changes in sugar and acidity levels in August.
Pruning can also make a difference to yields, as the Cordon Royat method tends to produce less fruit. Céline Fontaine at Domaine Fontaine-Gagnard observed that the Pinot on Cordon Royat was “lower-yielding and ripened more quickly and easily than that on Guyot. The Pinot on Guyot is one-year-old wood and gives more energy to produce a higher volume of fruit—maybe too much in 2023, but in 2024 the Guyot was better for Pinot. So, it’s good to have both.” Armand Heitz also commented that his regional wines, which are Cordon trained, had a lower crop in 2023 and ripened well. Both examples are from the Côte de Beaune, where the Pinot yields were generally lower than on the Côte de Nuits.
There is an argument that yields can be too low in a hot vintage, leading to overconcentration. A very diligent producer in the Côte de Nuit left only five bunches per vine, and tasting the result, I was left wondering whether the wines might not be too condensed: Pinot Noir at 35hl/ha in this vintage is exceedingly concentrated.
Jeremy Seysses remarks, “I think we need to rethink the whole yield thing. With warmer and earlier harvests, it may be a good thing to have a larger crop. It’s easy to see high yields and to manage them. Yet in years when we have heat and a small crop—2020 is an ideal example—the wines can become a bit freakish.”
Health
Many growers commented on the onset of botrytis in July. August was humid and bouts of rain accelerated the spread of botrytis. As Clément Barthod remarks, “We already saw botrytis in July, and with the rain in August, the health was quickly deteriorating.” Many commented on the deterioration of the fruit in early September. There was probably more rot in more humid areas with more clsay. Some said the botrytis dried in the heat, others that the berries went mushy.
Acid rot was not widespread in 2023, but it was present, and it’s irritating when some producers feign no knowledge of the issue. Others are more candid. At Méo-Camuzet, winemaker Nacha Navarro remarks, “It was easy to take out the acid rot. You smelled it immediately when you passed it on the [sorting] table.” Frédéric Mugnier was not surprised to see it, since “the skins were very thin and fragile.” Several producers told me it was generally in vines near trees, where insects attacked the thin-skinned berries. (You may recall 2014, when there was widespread damage from the fruit fly Drosophila suzukii, which attacked berries, especially near houses and orchards.)
Jeremy Seysses recalled some concern as the skins were soft on the sun affected side “the sun cooks the enzymes and protein on one side and fermentation can start inside the berry. If an attack [he was concerned about a wasps’ nest] happens early enough, when the berry is green, it will shrivel and fall off, but if the skin is thin and soft and there is sugar and the berry is damaged, acetic bacteria sets in.” In the event, they had no problem, but berries with acid rot will lead to higher levels of VA. Overall, however, I find the impact of gray rot to have been more serious in 2023.
“August was the most important month to understand the vintage,” recalls Frédéric Weber. “The first days were cloudy and not hot, and the véraison was long. From the 15th to the 20th, there was a heatwave, so ripening was rapid. There was a storm on the 25th, with 25–30mm [1–1.2 inches] of rain. For Pinot Noir, this meant dilution, because the grapes increased in size and stopped ripening. It was cold and cloudy and there was disease and gray rot. Then after August 30 we had a second heatwave and ripening was very, very rapid!”
Nadine Gubin at Jacques Prieur recalls that there was more rain in the Côte de Nuits than in the Côte de Beaune. Yves Confuron, who has vines from Gevrey-Chambertin, to Nuit-St-Georges, as well as in Pommard, remarked that there was less rain in Pommard, where the berries were more dehydrated and the skins were thicker. This would account for the higher concentration in some villages in the Côte de Beaune, and according to several producers it was also drier in Marsannay.
Many producers view 2023 as a warm vintage, and it certainly tastes like one. But Frédéric Mugnier argues that it was a cold vintage with a few days of heatwave. And it is true that until mid-August it was a relatively cool vintage.
Harvest and selection
However you perceive the season, come the heatwave, when temperatures hit 40ºC (104ºF), it was important to pick quickly, since sugar in the grapes was escalating and acidity dropping. Of course, the pace at which a vineyard ripens is dependent on several variables—notably terroir and crop load—but in 2023 Burgundy, things concertinaed. Unripe fruit shriveled.
On the Côte de Beaune, some started harvesting on the last couple of days in August, while many began at the beginning of September. On September 12, there was rain. On the Côte de Nuits, I gather that at least one grower began in Vosne-Romanée on August 28. Among those I visited, Dugat-Py and Comte Liger-Belair were the first to start—on September 4. The majority harvested September 9–17.
Everyone seemed to adapt the harvesting schedule, starting early in the morning as soon as it was light, and many finished by 1pm. Most producers did everything they could to make the pickers’ situation easier. At Jean-Baptiste Bouzereau in Meursault, they used the pool. As Céline Fontaine told me, “Many of our return pickers are pensioners who come because they enjoy it, and we had to stop them going into the vineyard in the afternoon.” A few producers continued harvesting into the afternoon and, sadly, there was a fatality in Chassagne.
Good selection was paramount for most, although a few, surprisingly, admitted to doing little. So high were the yields that everyone spoke of removing whole bunches rather than preserving the best section of each bunch as usual. For those who didn’t green-harvest, it was case of a “positive selection,” picking out the best bunches.
Paul Zanetti at Domaine Comte Armand was honest enough to say there was mold as well as very large bunches. He did no green-harvest and selected the best bunches on the sorting table, destemming everything because he was not confident in the stems.
Another producer who did not green-harvest was Guillaume Tardy, who instead made a positive selection and recalls, “Even though we have a lot of old vines, there was a large crop, with a rainbow of colors on the table—red, green… and there was botrytis and acid rot, but not as bad as in 2014.”
There were also sunburned and shriveled berries that needed to be eliminated on the sorting table. Many leaf-plucked on the shaded side of the row, which in July seemed a good idea. But not Sébastian Caillat at Domaine Lamy-Caillat in Chassagne. “For a few years now, I have done no leaf-plucking. In a warm vintage, with the sun so violent, I feel the grapes are better hidden behind a leaf.” Sometimes, though, it was beyond the producer’s control. In Pommard, Paul Zanetti found that the young vines lost their leaves and the fruit cooked.
“The grapes exposed to the sun at 2pm were like raisins,” recalls Denis Bachelet. These would normally drop off or be shaken off on a vibrating sorting table, but with late sunburn they needed to be extracted by hand. At Domaine du Couvent, there are two sorting tables, a vibrating table followed by manual sorting. At Domaine Perrot-Minot there are two sorting lines; the optical machine sorts destemmed berries, while another manual selection of the best bunches represents about 40% of each cuvée. “The optical sorting machine was working, although not at maximum capacity, as in 2024,” recalls Christophe Perrot-Minot.
Some commented that if it had not been for the heatwave and the late sunburn, the fruit would have been prefect. But as Louis-Michel Liger-Belair observed, “The fruit on the sorting table changed over the course of the harvest. The skins were much softer at the end.” Many on the Côte de Nuits said the skins were quite thin, which makes sense when you taste the wines that have low levels of tannin. A few said that the skins were normal, and only Jacques Devauges at Domaine des Lambrays saw thick skins in 2023: “We had more juice than many vintages, yet the skins were thick, with good phenolic potential.” On the Cote de Beaune, more producers commented on thicker skins.
The warm days in August and the heatwave in September caused problems in the vineyard, and yet they may well have been the saving grace in 2023. Without them, it would have been a challenge to ripen such a large crop, particularly for those who did not crop-thin.
2023 Burgundy in the winery
Whites
The fruit, analysis, and adjustments
In general, potential alcohol levels in Burgundy 2023 ranged from 11.9% to 14.5%. Some producers who picked early to preserve acidity chaptalized to reach 13–13.5% ABV; among them was Jeremy Seysses, who nudged Folatières from 12.5% to 13%, the magic figure below which many producers are uncomfortable offering white wine from the Côte de Beaune. (So, I imagine there was a huge run on sugar in 2024.)
But the sugars rose very quickly in 2023. Maxime Lafouge, of Domaine Lafouge in Auxey-Duresses, noted that the potential alcohol increased 1% every three days, and several others remarked on the efficacy of the yeast in 2023, which required just 16g/l sugar to make one degree of alcohol, rather than the more typical 18g/l.
The malic acid was low, often 1-1.5g/l instead of the classic 4g/l, and total acidity (TA) lay between 3g/l and 4g/l. The pHs after malolactic fermentation were around 3.3. At Vincent Girardin, the whites were harvested at potential alcohols of 13.7–13.8% and pHs of 3.25–3.3—“higher pHs than normal,” observes Eric Germain, “but we didn’t acidify, and the surprise is the good feeling of acidity now we taste them.”
The heatwave burned off the malic acidity, so there is barely any lactic, making 2023 another principally mono acid vintage. Without the milky lactic taste and texture, this subtly alters the traditional expression of white Burgundy. This trend will come to an abrupt halt with the 2024 vintage, and you may miss the sweeter feel.
Ben Leroux declares, “I like tartaric acidity, and we had 3.8–4.2g/l as tartaric in 2023. This was very good, much better than if it had been 3g/l. There was not much lactic acid going round the tartaric, but the result makes the wines more approachable young. It is more unusual now to find wines the way we used to have them, with high malic—but in 2024, we are back to classic 4–5g/l of malic.” He recalls, “In 2013, there was 7g/l malic.” (And I would add that the 2008s can feel very lactic.)
It was important for both reds and whites to cool the fruit or juice as quickly as possible, for it often came into the winery at 28ºC (82ºF). It is better to press Chardonnay when the grapes are cool, while for reds the destemmer does a better job on cool grapes.
Foulage, pressing, and decanting
Many crushed Chardonnay in 2023—no doubt to load more into the press. As many producers remarked, the presses were full and working constantly. Chardonnay skins were quite normal, and approaches differed in terms of how hard to press them. Some opted for caution. Charles Boillot pressed lightly and carefully settled the must, as the grapes came in dusty, but my impression is that there was a move among some growers to press a bit harder, made possible with the VCI.
The phenolics from crushing and harder pressing can provide structure to balance the ripe fruit, body, and alcohol in a warm vintage when acidity is low. At Bouchard Père & Fils, Frédéric Weber crushed and pressed harder for some batches, often mixing the resulting must with that from a pressing without foulage (crushing), where there was more than one. “The wines with foulage will be more precise, have more structure, and be more powerful. We have done this before. I did a very short débourbage [settling], as I wanted a lot of matter in the must.”
Sébastien Caillat found the analyses in 2023 very similar to those in 2018, remarking, “I learned from 2018 to extract more.” He has a manual, mechanical Vaslin press with which he presses hard. He observes, “With a large quantity, it is so important to cool the fruit down and not to overfill the press—better to do more smaller presses. In a very juicy vintage, we have to take more time—you need the juice to leave the press before scratching the skins. It was a good year to be manual pressing. We needed to extract more from the skins.”
Jean-Bapiste Bouzereau always likes to crush the grapes a little before putting them into a pneumatic press, as he fears that otherwise the final wine would miss something. “It does affect the pH, but the taste and the analysis are two different things. In 2018, we had no acidity in the analysis, yet the taste of the wine is not lacking. We have to make wine with our senses. We took all the lees. Every year I make a settling, but in 2022 and 2023, the lees were very clean.”
The fruit was clean and the lees were pleasant in 2023, which was fortuitous, given the issues of settling and the need to process quickly the large volume of fruit. Producers who like to ferment with plenty of lees were happy to take them. “I took more lees this year, recalls Bruno Colin. “When we racked a year later, it was about two to three liters per barrel.”
After pressing hard—“I stop when the gremlins start screaming!”—Brian Sieve took all the lees, with turbidities of more than 1,000 NTUs. He isolates the must from the hard press (at 1.5–2 bar) and settles this separately without SO2, before mixing it all together to ensure the lees are well-distributed before filling the barrels.
Many remarked on the difficulty of cooling the juice for the débourbage in tank, which is usually done at about 14ºC (57ºF). A cool temperature encourages speedier settling, often just overnight, but it was clearly a struggle to chill the juice, and many found it necessary to have the air-conditioning running constantly, even with temperature-controlled tanks.
Several producers said it was a reductive vintages for whites. There was some reduction, but it was not widespread or unsettling, and it’s no bad thing if wines are lightly reductive. To some extent, the reduction may be explained by when growers stopped spraying sulfur. Anne Laure Chartron stopped spraying on June 23, and Jean-Michel Chartron subsequently found that the lees were good, so he took most of them. Stressed fermenting yeast, however, can produce its own sulfur. Last year I commented on the increasingly widespread use of cultured yeast for making Chardonnay, for more control and less risk. Some of those replying on a spontaneous fermentation in 2023 struggled to finish the alcoholic fermentation, some wines stuck with a few degrees of sugar, so they had either to inoculate or to wait. A few were still waiting a year later.
Those who ferment or start the fermentation in temperature-controlled tanks were in a better position to manage the hot conditions. It is increasingly popular to start the fermentation in tank before transferring the wine into wood at a specific gravity (around 1050), by which time the juice will be fermenting strongly and moving it will feed the yeast with oxygen. Charles Ballot, of Domaine Ballot-Millot, who had always fermented in barrel, changed in 2024 after his 2023 whites stuck with 40–50g/l of sugar; he racked into tanks and inoculated in November, the malolactic fermentation (MLF) having finished back in March.
Both reds and whites started and finished MLF quickly for most producers. The higher pH levels and warm ambient temperatures were conducive for the bacteria, and there was very little malic acidity to convert. Early MLF is no bad thing, because the CO2 it generates will protect the wine, and once the bacteria have done their job, SO2 can be added. But increasingly the MLF is concurrent with fermentation, and if the MLF finishes and there is still some sugar, most producers will add a little SO2 at this stage.
Some prefer a later malolactic. “A late MLF is better for the wine,” insisted Paul Zanetti when we were discussing the whites, adding, “but if there is a problem, you cannot add SO2.” You don’t get to choose, and a few found the MLF struggled in 2023, possibly because the malic was so low that the bacteria just couldn’t get going.
Finishing
Some producers bottled early, before the end of the year. With most malos done and dusted swiftly, the whites are in place earlier. Richer wines, however, will benefit from a second winter, at least until January, but it’s important to tighten rather than to tire them. A second winter in barriques is asking a lot with high pHs, and some of those who typically return wine to barrel—Dominique Lafon among them—are moving them to tank instead.
Ben Leroux perceives that “The minerality is coming back and they are losing the fat.” Some of De Montille’s wines were already very creamy during fall 2024, but Brian Sieve is in no hurry to bottle the whites until spring or summer 2025. “There is quite a lot of protein in the whites, but time and temperature will take care of this. The richness will refine.”
“In a warm vintage, the wine needs more time in tanks,” remarks Charles Ballot. “In tank the wine is quiet and relaxed, and we find the freshness after a period of activity for the wine in barrels. While the 2024 will age longer in barrel, the 2023 needs the time in tank.”
Vessels
Although hotter vintages cannot support too much wood, quickly becoming too heavy, 20% of sappy, low- or no-toast oak (with little or none of the caramelized sugars that toasting brings) can enhance the sense of freshness on the finish. The cold 2024 vintage will support more new oak, which, given the small crop, is fortuitous, for it is likely to have a higher proportion. Now, however, there are other options, beyond rigidly sticking to the traditional barrel. It used to be quite unusual to see terra-cotta “amphorae,” concrete “eggs,” glass globes, and the like in Burgundy cellars—now it more unusual to see no evidence of such experimentation, and some producers are fully committed to these alternatives.
Caroline Lestimé at Domaine Jean-Noël Gagnard is experimenting with 7hl ceramic amphorae from Italy, in which she is aging some Chassagne-Montrachet Les Chenevottes. “I have lots of little stainless-steel tanks, but I wonder if amphorae have a softer touch, in a way. I would like to abandon wood ultimately, as we need to protect the forests. Also, I am very vigilant for brett and VA, and the wine is better protected in steel or ceramic vessels.” We tried her Chenevottes from three vessels. From barrique, the oak was strong on the aroma, but blended well on the palate, providing richness and generosity as well as tannins to balance the fruit and stretch the finish with a sappy note. From amphora, the wine was more subtle, floral, and delicate, with a touch of apricot, while the finish was pure and perfumed, but not as long as the barrel sample. From stainless steel, it was slightly bitter and cutting, straight and severe. The blend from all three vessels was the best.
At Comte Armand, Paul Zanetti is experimenting by fermenting his Aligoté in concrete tank, 600-liter oak barrels, and stainless steel. “We can control the porosity of the concrete, which gives fresher, purer wine with more minerality.” He found the combination of larger oak and the concrete best and continued with this in 2024.
More thought than previously is going into the size of oak barrels, rather than routinely using a traditional 228-liter pièce. Bruno Colin’s wines, for example, are fermented in 350-liter barrels. His father was among the first to move wholly to larger barrels about 20 years ago. Only the grands crus ferment in barriques, and are then transferred to glass globes. These days it is rare, thank goodness, to see a new 114-liter feuillette, an old-fashioned, oxidative, and oaky solution to fermenting a small quantity of grand cru.
Domaine Remi Jobard was probably the first where I tasted from Stockinger fudres, in the naughties, but these now have many devotees, among them Pablo Chevrot in Maranges: “There is less imprint from the wood,” he attests. “They also keep the lees in suspension, allowing me to use less sulfur, so the wine is more expressive of its terroir.”
Reds
Analysis and Adjustments
In the Côte de Beaune, the alcohol levels of the reds range from 13.5% to 14%, whereas in Côte de Nuits most finished with 13% to 13.8%. In both Côtes, some wines have higher levels, but fewer in the Côte de Nuits where, conversely, some producers chaptalized. Guillaume Tardy augmented his cuvées by 0.5% to reach 12.8–13.1% ABV, while Jeremy Seysses tweaked Domaine Dujac’s Gevrey Combottes and was rather nonplussed when it finished at 14% ABV. Arthur Clair tells me, “I chaptalized those wines at 12.4 or 12.5% to get to 12.8%, which is better for aging and lifting the aromatics.” Frédéric Mugnier prefers not to change the alcohol level, so resorted to saignée for the first time since 1999.
Total acidity was low—between 3g/l and 4 g/l at harvest, after which some tartaric will have been lost during fermentation. Typically, malic acidity was between 1g/l and 1.5g/l, so the malolactic had little impact on the pH. With predominately tartaric acidity, the reds taste sweeter on the finish than usual, and with lowish total acidity, the tannins appear softer. Together with the glycerol in the more alcoholic wines, the overall impression can become jammy, but not always. Chevrot’s Maranges Premier Cru Le Croix Moines, for example, has a very high pH but tastes fresh.
Many ended up with pHs around 3.5–3.6. “I was anxious about the acidity before the MLF,” recalls Louis-Michel Liger-Belair, “but the acidity shows quite well. I don’t think it is an overripe vintage. The pH is not high—on average, 3.35 before and 3.5 after, which would have been high in the 1990s but is normal now.” Other producers have higher alcohol and pH levels. At Gros Frère et Soeur, Vincent harvested September 14–27, finishing with pHs between 3.8 and 3.9 and alcohol levels around 14%, which was not uncommon elsewhere.
It is little wonder that the red wines of this vintage are so varied. While some producers chaptalized, others acidified, while some may have done both, even though that is not permitted for the same wine.
No-one likes acidifying their wines. The Burgundians are far more comfortable with chaptalizing, for obvious reasons. At Seguin-Manuel, Thibaut Marion lightly acidified his Beaune reds at the beginning of fermentation. The acidity is well-integrated, and I like the bright finish on these wines. Others prefer to acidify later. “I like to wait and acidify after the MLF. It is too blind to do it before,” says Jérôme Flous at Faiveley, who acidified some Gevrey and Chambolle wines that had pHs of 3.8. By contrast, Paul Chéron at Domaine du Couvent made a trial on its Nuits-St-Georges Premier Cru Aux Murgers, which had a pH of 4, but unsatisfied with the result, he decided to leave the wine well alone.
Those using a proportion of whole-bunch fermentation wisely added some tartaric acidity, among them Christophe Perrot-Minot. Stems have the effect of increasing the pH, while at the same time giving the impression of greater freshness, although Jeremy Seysses found that there wasn’t much potassium uptake in 2023, so the pHs held well. Others had a different experience, however: Frédéric Weber found high potassium uptake, possibly due to the heavy bursts of rain in August.
Why should you be interested in pH? We’re told that low pH is important for aging, but I am convinced that good balance and healthy fruit are more significant. Of more concern are volatile acidity and brett—on the increase in Burgundy, encouraged by high pHs and warmer cellars. At Faiveley, Jérôme Flous is among those rigorously checking for brett. If any wine reaches 500y/ml, he racks off lees and cleans the barrel before returning the wine. “Customers want bright, pure fruit, and brett gives earthier notes.” Arthur Clair added some tartaric: “The wines taste fresh, but I’m more afraid of brett, so that’s why I acidify.” There will be many wines with a hint of brett in 2023, for the conditions were perfect for it to spread.
Volatile acidity is at the higher end of the legal limit of 0.8, but some wines will be above that. Generally, they are 0.5–0.7. Some argue that VA is helpful in a hot, low-acid vintage, to lift the wine, but I don’t want to smell it.
Whole-bunch
It was a tricky vintage in which to use whole-bunch. Many destemmed, afraid of green tannin, and yet some of the most refined, chiffon-textured wines are made with a high proportion of whole-bunch. It was only for the experienced and only advisable when the stems were fully ripe, which would be unlikely without a green-harvest, so it is not surprising that most producers destemmed—if not for a lack of ripeness then for lack of space.
Nevertheless, producers who normally use whole-bunch, continued to do so, only decreasing the proportion when there was insufficient space in the vats or the pH was too high. Arthur Clair kept to the usual 50% whole-bunch, except where the pH was 3.6–3.7. Dugat-Py’s grands crus are 100% whole-bunch, but at Dujac they destemmed about 20–30% for lack of space. Jacques Devauges used 80% whole-bunch for Clos des Lambrays.
Where whole-bunch was used, a light touch was needed. It is best when you sense the freshness, perhaps with just a hint of mint. Masters of the subtle use of whole-bunch are Christophe Perrot-Minot and Christophe Roumier. The former uses about 40%, but discreetly. “We don’t use much pigeage, and we press very lightly to 0.3–0.4 bar. After this, it is too dusty,” he says.
Louis-Michel Liger-Belair used a little whole-bunch on some cuvèes. “I wanted more backbone and lift from the clay soil of Suchots and Brûlée, so used some whole-bunch to give them more density and strictness.” Paul Chéron also likes to use some whole-bunch for wines from clay soils to add structure. At Faiveley, Jerôme Flous destemmed, but the single barrel of Musigny has 50% whole-bunch and is exquisitely finely textured. So, it’s all about the quality of the bunch.
Fermentation and extraction
Destemmed or not, the pressing issue was handling the volume of fruit and managing the temperature. Christophe Perrot-Minot chilled down the winery to 13ºC (55ºF) for a week before harvest. The best-prepared had temperature-controlled vats; others managed with radiators dunked into the vat with chilled fluid in the system. Where there was some juice from destemming, this could be pumped through a heat exchanger, although Charles Magnien is among those who feels that juice is too vulnerable to oxygen to be pumped. To retain aromas and fresh fruit, he made a cold-soak at 8ºC (46ºF) in temperature-controlled tanks, then capped the fermentation temperature at 27ºC (80ºF)—all to good effect, as Domaine Henri Magnien has produced delightful 2023s
If a fermentation is too hot and quick, there is little time for extraction; and some with no temperature-control, including Armand Heinz, produced very light wine. Bear in mind that many of the bunches that went into the winery were large, juicy, and thin-skinned. It rained several times in August and the grapes swelled. I have mentioned the late-onset fruit-shrivel, but these bunches should have been removed. There was certainly a tendency for cooler temperatures and shorter vatting in 2023.
Those who went for more extraction included Jérôme Flous, who made one pigeage every day. “In 2020, 2022, and 2015, we had to be careful with extraction, but in 2021 and 2023 there was no risk in extracting more—the skin was very thin and there was so much juice.” Maxime Cheurlin at Domaine Georges Noëllat destemmed everything in 2023, and started with gentle remontage, but then at a density of 1030, he firmly punched down, using heat, alcohol, and physical means to extract—and has achieved very smooth tannins with this approach.
There are wines in this vintage with insufficient tannin structure. Gevrey-Chambertin and Nuits-St-Georges, in particular, can feel lacking. But kid gloves were necessary in the Côte de Beaune, where the skins were thicker and the berries often smaller. At Vincent Girardin, winemaker Eric Germain has many Volnays for which he used a maximum of three punch-downs and five pump-overs, and most had fewer than that. The tannins are finely textured.
It irritates me when producers say they made an “infusion.” Wine is no more tea than it is “natural.” As ever, it is not the technique, but how it is employed. At Genot-Boulanger Guillaume Lavollée made just two pigeages and used largely remontage. He is focused on aromas and fruit, and has produced Volnay and Pommard with delicate texture. On the Côte de Beaune, I am happy with fruit and more ethereal tannins, particularly in a hot vintage.
There are different ways of achieving a fine and silky texture, but generally it seems that people gravitated toward remontage and away from pigeage. Thibaut Marion describes his punch-down as “wet” pigeage, made at the same time as remontage to soften the impact. I encountered greater use of rack-and-return, which can be more extractive than remontage, which seemed surprising until I questioned further.
When using remontage, just a proportion of fermenting juice, often quite small, is removed and returned over the cap, through which it filters down; while in rack-and-return all the juice is taken and the cap, now at the bottom of the tank, has to rise up, moving through the wine and extracting more from it, particularly where the level of alcohol is high. More producers are employing it as a technique to remove unwanted sediment for a purer result. There are notes of rot in the 2023 vintage, which could have been reduced if more had used this technique. Maybe more will take this approach for the 2024 vintage.
Charles Ballot decants the reds off sediment early to clean the juice. His VAs are lower than most, at 0.35, and he is sure that cleaning the juice helped. Paul Zanetti uses rack-and-return to remove the unwanted sediment, but from the wine. He concedes it is more extractive than remontage, so he only does it twice, at a density of 1040. Jérôme Castagnier uses rack-and-return at the end of the fermentation “to gain more density in the mid-palate; not more tannin, but fullness,” he explains.
Jacques Devauges uses only remontage, but presses quite hard, at 1.5–1.6 bar, to break the berries, as only 20% is destemmed. The juice released continues to ferment in tank. “I start it like a red and fine like a white,” says Jacques. It took ten days to finish. After which he leaves it for another ten days before barreling down with only fine lees. I notice more focus in Burgundy with this setting of the stage, which has several benefits.
Barreling down and racking
Some found 2023 Burgundy a reductive vintage for reds, but I found it minimal in comparison with the naughties, when by late-October reds would often become quite reductive. Worst offenders would be racked off the gross lees and returned to barrel. Fewer reductive notes can be explained by more careful setting of the lees and warmer cellars. For reduction at this stage depends on the quality and quantity of lees. Arthur Clair detected “A touch of reduction, so I wanted to separate the lees before barreling down. The skins were thin, but strangely there was a lot of sediment—1.5% of lees. The wines were concentrated enough, so these went off to the distillery.” Christophe-Perrot Minot points out that it is important not routinely to add sulfur to the tank, but rather to wait and check, since some sulfur can be held within the bunches.
Racking mid-élevage usually involves pumping, which is a good enough reason for leaving the wine alone if possible, although wine can be pushed gently with gas (nitrogen or oxygen) if it is reduced. But many still rack to remove lees, modify the oak, and/or make an assemblage of barrels and then return the cuvée to barrel, so it has another winter to marry.
Jeremy Seysses prefers to rack during aging so he can barrel down with more gross lees; he feels that the wine integrates with the barrels better this way and that subsequently there should be less reduction in bottle. A few producers rack from barrel to barrel. Denis Bachelet does this—from older to newer barrels and vice versa—to modify the oak. At Domaine Comte Georges de Vogüé, Jean Lupatelli racks-and-returns to the same oak in order to monitor the marriage of oak with each wine, as he is quite new to the domaine and still experimenting.
Frédéric Mugnier always racks after a year, blends to marry the cuvée, and returns with finer lees to the same set of barrels. He admits that with the change in climate and consumer expectation, the approach could change, but for now he likes to continue in the same way.
Generally, however, routine racking seems to be on the wane, in preference for longer settling, making racking unnecessary for reductive reasons. In Morey, Jérôme Castagnier settles for a month before barreling down. If the wines are not racked, the wine has to be cleaner, with fewer lees before barreling down, although Jérôme points out that without the reductive lees, the barrels require careful monitoring and topping-up once a week.
Christophe Roumier, however, has his reasons for a short settling period and moves his wine to barrel fairly quickly. “If it is cold before the malolactic, the tartrates will precipitate and we can lower the pH, which is useful in a vintage like 2023, so I don’t leave it in the winery too long as it’s warm and the MLF will start.”
That apart, given the issues of health and harvest, there was a move to barreling down later, with cleaner juice, but in any case, with light pressing (given many were at maximum yields), there were fewer lees.
In Chambolle, Clément Boillot is among the younger generation who are racking reds before, or straight after, harvest into stainless steel for a second winter. “This help retain freshness, especially in lower acid vintages.” This trend, which has emerged quite recently, can be very useful for hotter vintages.
Like the whites, the 2023 Burgundy reds can easily be dominated by oak, with too much toast or flavor, but its judicious use can be useful. The sappiness of low- or no-toast can enhance the sense of freshness and provide some tannin. Christophe Roumier, who uses only about 25% new oak for his premiers and grands crus, reduced to 20% in 2023. Even the grands crus are easily swamped, but some producers persist with too much new oak for my palate. Maxime Cheurlin tells me that it is a vintage in which to use more new oak. He likes Cavin, very low toast, which he says is very pure, while others find Cavin too creamy and prefer François Frères. I find François Frères very marked during the aging, requiring longer to integrate than many coopers’ barrels, but they can add tension to wines that have the substance to carry it.
If the wines are settled sufficiently in tank after racking, less prep is necessary for bottling. Jérôme Castagnier settles for six weeks after racking before bottling so that he does not have to fine or filter. “This gives me finer and purer wines.” Quite so.
Finishing
Many will bottle reds early. D’Angerville has never bottled before Christmas, but will for 2023. At Vincent Girardin, Eric Germain remarks, “With the richness and sweetness at the end of the reds, I will bottle early. What more can I gain from leaving them longer?”
And what could one lose? Early bottling is prompted by high pHs and/or higher VA levels, and some reds on the Côte de Beaune were already bottled when I visited in the fall of 2024, among them Ben Leroux’s Beaune Cent Vignes, with a pH of 3.8. The antiseptic properties of sulfur are negligible at high pHs, leaving wines vulnerable to brett. Some producers were more candid than others. One described the progress of a Pommard with a pH of 3.6 and post ferment VA of 0.3, which had increased by December to 0.6 and by March 0.8. “It was steadily climbing. It was too risky. With some cuvées we bottled early before harvest to stop VAs increasing further.”
