Winemaker Notes
Being on the border of the Moulin-à-Vent cru, the core of Roilette’s Fleurie terroir is atypical of Fleurie, rich in clay and the mineral manganese instead of all granite; the wines are thus more structured than many Fleurie wines. The estate vines are farmed sustainably by lutte raisonnée and the soils worked by hand, only twice a year and very carefully in order to not do damage to the older plants’ roots. This bottling comes from vines averaging 30 to 45 years old. The fruit is hand harvested and fermented in whole clusters with native yeasts, kicking off Roilette’s version of traditional Beaujolais semi-carbonic vinification. The temperature-controlled fermentation takes place in open-top neutral vats with the cap kept submerged; the maceration for the Fleurie is approximately 14 days. Aging takes places in vat until bottling in the following summer.
Professional Ratings
-
Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2017 Fleurie is justifying my optimism last year, as the wine's tannins—despite the hail-impacted vintage—are melting and it's becoming increasingly supple and charming. Displaying scents of blackberries, raspberries, violets and licorice, it's medium to full-bodied, fine-boned and nicely balanced.
Delightfully playful, but also capable of impressive gravitas, Gamay is responsible for juicy, berry-packed wines. From Beaujolais, Gamay generally has three classes: Beaujolais Nouveau, a decidedly young, fruit-driven wine, Beaujolais Villages and Cru Beaujolais. The Villages and Crus are highly ranked grape growing communes whose wines are capable of improving with age whereas Nouveau, released two months after harvest, is intended for immediate consumption. Somm Secret—The ten different Crus have their own distinct personalities—Fleurie is delicate and floral, Côte de Brouilly is concentrated and elegant and Morgon is structured and age-worthy.
The bucolic region often identified as the southern part of Burgundy, Beaujolais actually doesn’t have a whole lot in common with the rest of the region in terms of climate, soil types and grape varieties. Beaujolais achieves its own identity with variations on style of one grape, Gamay.
Gamay was actually grown throughout all of Burgundy until 1395 when the Duke of Burgundy banished it south, making room for Pinot Noir to inhabit all of the “superior” hillsides of Burgundy proper. This was good news for Gamay as it produces a much better wine in the granitic soils of Beaujolais, compared with the limestone escarpments of the Côte d’Or.
Four styles of Beaujolais wines exist. The simplest, and one that has regrettably given the region a subpar reputation, is Beaujolais Nouveau. This is the Beaujolais wine that is made using carbonic maceration (a quick fermentation that results in sweet aromas) and is released on the third Thursday of November in the same year as harvest. It's meant to drink young and is flirty, fruity and fun. The rest of Beaujolais is where the serious wines are found. Aside from the wines simply labelled, Beaujolais, there are the Beaujolais-Villages wines, which must come from the hilly northern part of the region, and offer reasonable values with some gems among them. The superior sections are the cru vineyards coming from ten distinct communes: St-Amour, Juliénas, Chénas, Moulin-à-Vent, Fleurie, Chiroubles, Morgon, Regnié, Brouilly, and Côte de Brouilly. Any cru Beajolais will have its commune name prominent on the label.