2016 Saint Veran Lieu (Inter)dit

Long-time Mâconnais veteran Jean-Marie Guffens has been telling me for the past 25 years that consumers who pay a premium for white Burgundies from the swanky villages of the Côte de Beaune are being taken for a ride (his actual words are not appropriate for a family publication). There is so much more value in the Mâconnais, he noted in October, “and people here do better viticulture. In the Côte d’Or, they work their vines like they’re the gardens of Versailles, but in a warming climate trimming the vines lower is not beneficial because it reduces acidity and speeds up the ripening of the grapes."

Guffens described the Verget '16s as “a classic style of wine, made from grapes picked late with average richness.” Yields were almost normal, except in hail-affected Davayé, where he started harvesting the tiny quantity of overripe grapes on September 19. (Similarly, his Saint-Véran vines at his home estate of Guffens-Heynen produced just one or two clusters per vine and made very ripe, rich wines.” In most sites, though, the ‘16s shows a bit of dilution compared to the ‘14s but are in a similar style, he told me. “Two thousand sixteen was not a year to pick early, and those who did were mostly those who picked too late in 2015." He loves the ‘15s for their acidity and concentration and believes that 2017 will be in the same style but with a bit less alcohol and depth. As to when he’d advise his clients to drink the ‘16s, he responded that they’re all good now. “Who am I to tell people to cellar them?” Alcohol levels in the '16s are typically between 12.9% and 13.5%, whereas the '15s are around 14.5% and possess what Guffens described as "much more acidity."