Winemaker Notes
Pairs beautifully with game birds, poultry, and mature cheeses.
Professional Ratings
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James Suckling
Aromas of blackberries, leaves and spices. Some meat. Medium body, firm and silky tannins and a savory finish. A little tight and shy. Better in 2021.
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Wine Enthusiast
The wine is dense with fine concentration and a solid dry tannin character at the back. It is full of black fruits and balanced acidity. Its richness reflects the quality of the vintage and its aging potential. Drink from 2022.
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Wine Spectator
This is lively and smooth, evoking cherry, currant and earth flavors, underlined by burly tannins. Closes down on the finish, with the fruit coming back in the aftertaste. Best from 2022 through 2038.
Thin-skinned, finicky and temperamental, Pinot Noir is also one of the most rewarding grapes to grow and remains a labor of love for some of the greatest vignerons in Burgundy. Fairly adaptable but highly reflective of the environment in which it is grown, Pinot Noir prefers a cool climate and requires low yields to achieve high quality. Outside of France, outstanding examples come from in Oregon, California and throughout specific locations in wine-producing world. Somm Secret—André Tchelistcheff, California’s most influential post-Prohibition winemaker decidedly stayed away from the grape, claiming “God made Cabernet. The Devil made Pinot Noir.”
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.