Winemaker Notes
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.
Occupying the most northerly combe (the French term for a valley that cuts through a hillside) of the Côte de Beaune, Pernand-Vergelles sits to the west of and behind the hill of Corton. The most sought after whites of the village come from the slope of Pernand on the side of Corton where Pernand-Vergelles shares the Grand Cru Corton-Charlemagne with Aloxe-Corton. The best red producing Cru is Les Vergelles, which overlaps into Savigny-les-Beaune. Reds here are fleshy, seductive and structured while whites are both lively and age worthy.