Côte de Beaune 2021: New Releases

This village wine is 100% destemmed and has a sapid, redcurrant, spiced pomegranate character, with long, lightly structured tannins holding it together. This is a great entry point for one of Pommard’s most promising new voices.

This is a wonderful site in Beaune, high up on the hill to the south of the town. The 100% whole bunch works extremely well here, making for a salty, charming wine. There’s red currant and red plum depth and a freshness in the length, all enveloped in silky, fine-boned tannins.

This south facing parcel is tucked up the valley slope, so on the Beaune (i.e. north) side of the village, facing directly towards Volnay. It’s a cool site, thanks to the fresh breeze that is drawn down through the vines, but the white soil and south-facing exposure means it can heat up pretty quickly when the sun shines. Joannes has used 50% whole bunch fruit in the vinification here. There’s a wonderful purity of red plum and cherry fruit as a result, with fine, slightly chalky tannins. This has fabulous elegance.

This magnificent vineyard in Pommard is a prime contender for promotion to grand cru. The wine shows a nicely spicy hint of reduction, and the tannins build in dramatic layers. Unlike some Rugiens, which can need the best part of a decade to even approach their drinking window, this should, thanks to the graceful and elegant structure of its tannins (again from 100% whole bunch fruit) be relatively accessible from five years onwards.

The vines here have an average age of 70 years and enjoy one of the finest positions in the village, along with Rugiens. The soil on this side of the village, nearer to Beaune, is extremely complex, with a high mineral and limestone content towards the top of the slope. This makes for a more ethereal, delicate, and elegant expression of Pommard than perhaps we are used to, and Joannes has managed to extract the most perfumed, supple, fine- grained tannins in this 2021 from 100% whole bunch fruit. Really excellent.