Winemaker Notes
The Charlemagne climate, the historical heart of the Corton Charlemagne Grand Cru appellation harmoniously rounds off the hill of Corton on its western side. The vines facing west are exposed to the sun from mid-morning until sunset, a unique feature in Burgundy. The air circulation caused by the neighboring hills ventilates the vineyard and preserves the freshness of the grapes. Bonneau du Martray's vineyard run from top to bottom of the hill, where the thickness of the clays, silts, marls and different types of limestone make up a mosaic of soil with very different requirements and results: the parcels at the foot of the forest on the top of the hill give the wine a crystalline appearance, with floral and citrus fruit notes. The vines in the heart of the hill structure the wine and bring grain to it, while the parcels at the bottom of the hill, richer in minerals, bring the power of Charlemagne. The composition of this unique Bonneau du Martray cuvée reflects the complexity and richness of this great terroir, the most authentic representation of Charlemagne's terroir.
Professional Ratings
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
Bottled in May 2024, the 2022 Corton-Charlemagne Grand Cru is showing brilliantly, wafting from the glass with notes of sweet stone and orchard fruit mingled with hints of nutmeg, iodine, freshly baked bread and vanilla pod. Full-bodied, satiny and seamless, it's deep and layered, with terrific mid-palate plenitude, lively acids and chalky structuring extract, this rivals the more incisive 2020 version as the finest wine from Bonneau du Martray in recent years.
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Decanter
After a tasting of the components of the parcel-by-parcel approach the winery takes, a representative blend leaves no doubt that this will be an epic vintage for Bonneau du Martray. It is a wine of richness and depth, with aromas and flavours ranging from citrus to ripe apple and nectarine, and complex nuances of flint, beeswax, smoke, and hay. The texture is dense but a lively acidity carries the wine to a thrillingly long finish. Ideally one would wait seven to 10 years to open this wine; it will certainly last another 30 beyond that at least.
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Vinous
The 2022 Corton-Charlemagne Grand Cru is a gorgeous wine. It is also surprisingly open-knit. Soft contours wrap around a core of apricot, ripe pear, chamomile, marzipan and dried flowers. The 2022 spent twelve months in barrel followed by six months in a combination of mostly stainless steel with some sandstone amphora and larger-format oak. This is an undeniably attractive and engaging wine. Ideally, it would be nice to see a bit more Charlemagne energy. Then again, 2022 was marked by very warm, dry weather and four heat spikes. It will be interesting to see how this develops in bottle.
One of the most popular and versatile white wine grapes, Chardonnay offers a wide range of flavors and styles depending on where it is grown and how it is made. While it tends to flourish in most environments, Chardonnay from its Burgundian homeland produces some of the most remarkable and longest lived examples. California produces both oaky, buttery styles and leaner, European-inspired wines. Somm Secret—The Burgundian subregion of Chablis, while typically using older oak barrels, produces a bright style similar to the unoaked style. Anyone who doesn't like oaky Chardonnay would likely enjoy Chablis.
Prevailing over the charming village of Aloxe, the hill of Corton actually commands the entire appellation. Corton is the only Grand Cru for Pinot Noir in the entire Côte de Beaune. Its Grand Crus red wines can be described simply as “Corton” or Corton hyphenated with other names. These vineyards cover the southeast face of the hill of Corton where soils are rich in red chalk, clay and marl.
Dense and austere when young, the best Corton Pinot Noir will peak in complexity and flavor after about a decade, offering some of the best rewards in cellaring among Côte de Beaune reds. Pommard and Volnay offer similar potential.
The great whites of the village are made within Corton-Charlemagne, a cooler, narrow band of vineyards at the top of the hill that descends west towards the village of Pernand-Vergelesses. Here the thin and white stony soils produce Chardonnay of exceptional character, power and finesse. A minimum of five years in bottle is suggested but some can be amazing long after. Fully half of Aloxe-Corton is considered Grand Cru.