2023 Burgundy Supplement

BY ANTONIO GALLONI | FEBRUARY 13, 2025

This brief supplement to Neal Martin’s extensive report on the 2023 Burgundies covers several dozen wines I tasted on my most recent trip through the region. Readers will want to revisit Neal’s article for an in-depth look at the growing season and the conditions that shaped the wines.

A Personal Journey

I am not exactly sure of when I first became acquainted with the wines of Burgundy, but it was in high school. I remember my maternal grandfather serving a bottle of Trapet Chambertin at Sunday lunch and waxing poetic about it. I am sure that bottle was not inexpensive, but there was nothing in any way luxurious about drinking a bottle of Grand Cru Burgundy back then. I was captivated by the label and wanted to understand what all the words meant. High school was not an easy time. It probably isn’t for anybody. I was a terrible student, constantly in trouble, often suspended and not at all interested in school. All I wanted to do was play music. But I also had a growing interest in the wines my parents sold in their shop. One year, for French class, I decided to do a project on Burgundy. A very kind friend of my mother’s owned a French restaurant. She saved the labels of wines she sold and gave them to me for a project I did on the various villages and appellations. I suppose that was my first wine writing!

Another pivotal moment arrived in 2000. It was my first visit to Burgundy, right as the Euro football championship was getting started. My beloved Italy made a very unlikely run all the way to the final, only to be crushed by a France team that did not give up until the very end and ultimately won the championship on a last-minute Golden Goal.