The Burgundian truth

I have the pleasure and privilege to be able to chat to vigneron friends in the streets just in front of the Winehog office almost every day.

On my way through Nuits-Saint-Georges, I normally meet further vignerons telling me a part of their world in Burgundy – just chatting informally.

The people I often speak to are Pascal and his son Odilon Marchand, PO Garcia, Aurelie Ledy from Ledyvin … and from “abroad”, Louis-Michel Liger-Belair, Jane Eyre, Tomoko and Allie Mills.

These are people I like, and they create a mosaic of facts, sayings and rumours that I use in my daily work. This gives me a very valuable, almost hands-on feeling with the vineyards, the wines and the region as a whole.

The “biased truth …”

There is also quite a bias in what I am told … often it’s an unknown tendency to focus on certain topics, and sometimes even exaggerate a bit to make the severity of the topic tangible even to an ignoramus like me.

Example … hail struck Marsannay badly – sad, sad event … and the first chats suggested that the harvest was lost … 100% … lost

This could well be the truth for some in the core of the hailstorm … however, as a day or two go by, the reports are less dramatic … 20-30% destruction… also very severe but means you have 70% left in the vineyard you can hope for until harvest.

This is natural … first shock, then despair… then evaluation and judging the real damage … normally will take a few days as you see the damage develop in the vines.

So the truth was 100% damage when we spoke just after the event happened… and equally correct 30% when the vigneron evaluated a week later. Making wine is often a rollercoaster ride of emotions with nature making the big bumps on the trip.

So when I write my reports … I need to somehow validate and bring chats from different vignerons together to make a “full” picture of Marsannay … not saying too much and reducing the bias in the initial chat.

Again … all events are unique for the individual vigneron … as he has another plot that could be hit differently by the hail.

Burgundy is individual, hence also complex

The vineyards are divided into numerous plots … some vineyards have more than 50 owners, each having a small plot of the vineyard.

The vineyards have been divided into plots for many years … and the vines have been replanted once and sometimes twice or more times individually – hence the clone, the massale or sepage is different from plot to plot.

This also means that they react differently to the meteorological challenges and diseases nature throws at the vineyard.

This is also why you can say anything conclusive about a vineyard… the terroir might be almost the same … but the sepage is different.

And when a vigneron says that he has issues with sunburns on the plot, it applies to him but not necessarily to the neighbor on the vineyard, as his canopy management could protect the grapes better.

All can in principle be correct …

So this is also a part of the Burgundian Truth!