Bob cooked a braised pork shoulder last night
and we drank a glass of Monthelie les
Duresses Premier Cru 2006 from Paul
Garaudet.
It was spot-on spectacular!
Velvety smooth with delicate tannins and red
and black fruit flavors. The perfect companion with slow cooked, braised meats.
"The 2006 Red Burgundies are exceptionally aromatic
and
elegant with the best transparency to the
underlying terroir since the 2001s, all
wrapped in admirably persistent finishes with
fine detail and a more pronounced sense of
minerality than most vintages possess."
-Allen Meadows, Burghound
I think a lot of people believe that buying Burgundy
is treacherous terrain. Siren temptresses,
beguiling and mysterious, who sometimes are
not what we want them to be and who do not
measure up to the credit card receipt.
Stop right there! It's because they've never
had Paul Garaudet's Monthelie in their glass.
It is a beautiful expression of Pinot Noir in
all its splendor. There is a sublime
weightlessness and deep profundity at the
same time.
For me Burgundy ignites the senses in a way that
no
other French wine area can . If you haven't
visited, you must. Golden slopes, one-café
villages, the world's most tantalizing and
diverse wines. Friendly growers in rubber
boots and moth-eaten sweaters their wives
knitted in a previous decade will greet you
at the door and lead you down to their liquid
gold coffers.
But, yes, they can be expensive so you have
to remember the smart Burgundy drinkers' rule:
Look for wines from a lesser-known
appellation - they will be substantially cheaper
than one known the world over and can be just as good if the grower is
talented. That is where I come in: wading
through the average to get to the very good.
This brings me to Monthelie which is a little
hillside Arcadia. It straddles the borders of
Volnay and Meursault on hillside vineyards
that get excellent exposure. There are only
200 Montheliens as they are called, and there
isn't a village center -- just growers'
houses winding up a hillside to the requisite
church at the top of the village all
surrounded by vines.
For a long time, the wines of Monthelie were
part of their (famous and expensive) neighbor
Volnay. In fact, before Monthelie got its own
appellation, the wines were
labeled as Volnay.
Paul ages his reds in oak, a third of which is
new, for up to 18 months. He neither fines
nor filters his reds. The wines age with
grace - almost a sweetness - and a beautiful
equilibrium sets in.
La Revue du Vin de France has
characterized
Paul as a man of rigorous scruples who works
very hard to get the most out of a vintage.
They characterize his wines as supple and
distinguished with pure fruit and
well-integrated tannins with an exemplary
qualité-prix rapport particularly when
compared with other growers in that neck of
the woods.
Paul makes a village Monthelie cuvee Paul (his best selection from his village level vineyards) and also the
Premier Cru: les Duresses. The
Duresses has a bit more structure and
is a bit pricier. I used to buy only the
village, which is deeply colored with aromas
of blackberries and cherries and oak, but I
got sucked in by the richness and complexity of the 1er
cru les Duresses and now buy them both. You should also you will discover some of Burgundy's best red wine values.
Cynthia Hurley
