Beaune to Macon

Having been to Beaune a couple times on other trips, I paused just long the next morning to take a photo of the entrance to the Marche Aux Vins. It is one of many cooperatives in France where you can sample wine from a variety of vineyards. This is one of the more interesting ones.  

You receive your very own sommelier cup when you pay, Then off you go down into a cellar lined with several passages. Along the way you find wine barrels with a bottle of wine (and candle) atop each barrel. A card describes the wine and the price. You tip the bottle into your sommelier cup and taste. If you like it, tip the bottle and taste some more. Then off you go to the next barrel. There were about fifteen or eighteen wines to sample the times I went on two previous trips. I understand they have since cut back the number.

The first time I went through the cellar, I tasted the wines in the order I came to them, only to find out that the better and pricier wines were at the end of the line. So the next time I reconnoitered a bit before starting to sip and tasted them in descending order by price.

My favorite memory in the cellars aside from a delicious Montrachet (which was sadly not there on my second trip) was hearing someone exclaim up ahead 'this is the long schlong of a Burgundy'. It turned out he was a young attorney from Miami. We chatted a bit about wine and travel, and he gave me his business card. The slogan read 'Try us Before they Try You'.

Here are a couple of pictures, one of the entrance and one of the tasting menus offered today.

Then it was on to the destination for the day - the Macon wine region.   The Macon region is chardonnay country. In fact the best white wines in the whole of Burgundy are made from the chardonnay grape. (For those wishing to delve into the history and use of the varietal check out https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chardonnay.)  When you see label names of Montrachet, Pouilly-Fuisse, Meursalt, etc. think chardonnay.

There are many very small sub regions in Macon.  To do it justice I think at least a week or of tasting would be necessary. But I am here for only part of one day to spend in the area. So, I am off to only a couple of the sub regions.  One, Lugny,  produces some of the French chardonnay I buy in the U.S.

Perhaps you have seen Lugny on a wine label.

 

At this stop I tasted a total of seven chardonnays.  Below is a photo of the young lady who poured them for me.

Then it was off to Cave D’AZE for another round of tasting.

I sampled another seven here,again, all chardonnay.  Cave D'AZE is a cooperative like the one in Lugny, except that they also produce and sell wine from their own vineyards. One was simply delicious, and a bottle of it now travels with me. See below.

I saw several people buying and loading wine into their cars at both places. Here is one example from Lugny. These folks take their wine seriously.

We often hear people talk about ‘terroir’ when discussing wine. It’s the stuff in which the vines are planted and grow. Different soil conditions (and weather etc.) influence what the wine will taste like. A chardonnay in one type of soil will have different flavors than a vine planted in a another type of soil. I tasted chardonnays in Hungary last year that were new to me because they were planted in different types of soil.   Here is an example of terroir in one sub region of Macon. You can see lots of rock mixed in with the soil which is mostly limestone mixed with some clay.

One great treat of wine tasting is driving the small back roads that pass through ancient villages, some consisting of no more than perhaps a dozen or two dozen  houses with common walls. Their smooth plaster fronts colored usually from off white to light brown crowd either side of the road. They exude such charm, especially when the road leading to them is banked by stone walls on either side sprouting bright orange poppies.  I'll have to take a picture of one.