drc-corton

Domaine Romane-Conti in Corton: A New Player Comes to Charlemagne's Hill | On Wine by Jay McInerney - WSJ.com

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10000872396390444592404578032702578924238.html?KEYWORDS=corton+wine[08.10.2012 09:48:15]

Subscribe Log InEUROPE EDITION Wednesday, October 3, 2012

Interactive Graphics Comments (1) MORE IN LIFE & CULTURE

Recent Columns

Available to WSJ.com Subscribers

A New Player Comes to Charlemagne's Hill

1 of 12

Peyton Manning'sNew Horse

2 of 12

Ohio State: CollegeFootball's Antihero

3 of 12

A Portrait ofPremier LeaguePurgatory

Atl Eq Fra

ON WINE October 3, 2012

A New Player Comes to Charlemagne's Hill

Article

Now on GreekMenus: Tax Battle

Google Moves toDominate Map Apps

Turkey, SyriaContinue to TradeFire

Philippines,Rebels Reach Accord

Home World Europe U.K. U.S. Business Markets Market Data Tech Life & Culture Opinion Property Jobs

TOP STORIES IN

Life &Culture

By JAY MCINERNEY

WHEN DOMAINE de la Romane-Conti announced that it would be adding a wine fromCorton to its lineup, I was reminded of the moment when Heath Ledger and MichelleWilliams set up house in Brooklyn. Longtime residents felt validated by the injection ofcelebrity, and outsiders were intrigued by this Hollywood endorsement of a region thatnot long before had seemed glamour-challenged. True, Corton had a resident aristocrat,Bonneau du Martray, and an indie cult hero, Coche-Dury (just as Brooklyn had NormanMailer and Steve Buscemi), but both of these producers were known for their whites,whereas DRC was going to make a red wine, a cousin to its noble Romane-Conti andLa Tche.

The hill of Corton is the most strikinggeographical feature in Burgundy's Cted'Or, a thousand-foot-high dome of vinestopped with a tuft of forest, which marksthe boundary between the Cte deBeaune and the Cte de Nuits. It looksmuch grander than the other grand crus

Michel Joly for The Wall Street Journal

AROUND CORTON | Jean-Charles le Bault de la Morinire

Enlarge Image

SEARCH



Most Popular In Europe

1. Now on Greek Menus: Tax Battle

3. Romney Gets Post-Debate Jolt

4. How Capitalism Can Save Art

5. Turkey, Syria Continue to Trade Fire

Most Read Articles Feed

Sharing Notes on Wine With 230,000 Friends

A Pinot a Day: Is a Little Wine Good for You?

About Jay McInerney

Jay McInerney, the author of seven novels,including "Bright Lights, Big City," is one of thecountry's best-known contemporary fiction writers.He has also emerged as one of the freshest voicesin the wine-writing field. His monthly wine columns

for House & Garden magazine are collected in two books,"Bacchus and Me" and "A Hedonist in the Cellar." In 2006, he wasthe recipient of the James Beard Foundation's M.F.K. FisherDistinguished Writing Award. A collection of his short stories, "HowIt Ended," was published in 2009.

About Lettie Teague

Before joining The Wall Street Journal in 2010,Lettie Teague was the executive wine editor atFood & Wine magazine, where she wrote themonthly column Wine Matters. She received theJames Beard Foundation's M.F.K. Fisher

Distinguished Writing Award in 2003, won a 2005 James BeardAward for magazine columns and a 2012 James Beard Award forthis On Wine column. She is the author of "Educating Peter: HowAnybody Can Become an (Almost) Instant Wine Expert" publishedby Scribner in 2007, and the illustrator and co-author of "Fear ofWine: An Introductory Guide to the Grape," published by Bantam in1995.

Email Mr. McInerney and Ms. Teague at [email protected].

More in Life & CultureThe Hottest Label: Made in the U.S.A.

Ohio State: College Football's Antihero

A Portrait of Premier League Purgatory

The Fix Picks the NFL: Week 5

Podcast: Its Just a Triple Crown

Read Emailed Video Commented

2. Google Moves to Dominate Map Apps

Oenofile: Some of Corton's Finest

and has long been regarded as aprivileged site; the emperor Charlemagneowned part of the hill, and the precedentfor planting white grapes allegedlyoriginates with him, or rather, with hiswife, Liutgarde, who supposedly hatedthe way that red wine stained his beard.

White wines grown here are designatedas Corton Charlemagne. More Pinot Noiris planted here than Chardonnay,although in recent years the whites, madefrom vines planted on the lighter, chalkiersoils, have been more highly regarded.Most of the hill, more than 400 acres,

was awarded grand cru status in 1936, though not all of it seems to merit this rank.

According to historian Camille Rodier, the portion of the hill claimed by Charlemagnecorresponds to present-day Domaine Bonneau du Martray, which has been thestandard-bearer of Corton Charlemagne for many years. The domain is presided overby the elegant and articulate Jean-Charles le Bault de Morinire, a comte whoasCharlemagne once didtowers over most of his visitors. Jean-Charles took charge ofthe estate after his mother's death in 1994, abandoning a successful architecturalpractice in Paris to move to the tiny town of Pernand-Vergelesses, on the west side ofthe hill of Corton.

The 11 hectares of vineyards he took overwere beautifully situated but, he says,"the soils were dead, completely barren oflife after years of chemical treatments."Like many of his generation, he becameinterested in organic farming, and later,following the example of the DomaineRomane-Conti and Domaine Leflaive, inthe extreme form of it known asbiodynamics, based on the teachings ofRudolf Steiner. "We banished chemicalsin 1997," he told me when I visited thedomain this spring, "and we replaced thetractors with horses."

He was unable in the long run to findsomeone to care for the horses, switchingto a lightweight tractor, but he hasconverted the domain to biodynamicagriculture. He also hired a geologist tomap out the different blocks, based onsoil types. All of these measures seem tohave resulted in increasingly fine whites,although it will be years before the winesmade under the new regimen will revealtheir full potential; Corton Charlemagne is


Aubert de Villaine

Enlarge Image

Devon Jarvis for The Wall Street Journal

Click to view the interactive.

View Interactive



China Business Law BlogChina's Leading Business/Law Blogwww.chinalawblog.com

QTMM - Wall Street Wonderin The Making --- take a moment to read why quantum dots are thefuturehttp://www.QMCdots.com/

Business in ChinaDoing Business with Chinese, to know more their world heregochina.scmp.com

reticent and tightly wound in its youth. Itoften takes 10 years to really open up, atwhich point it has a voluptuous textureand stony intensity that make it the rivalof Grand Cru Chablis and the variousMontrachets. If Chablis was made foroysters, Corton Charlie is made forlobster.

I recently drank a 1971 and 1978, madeby Jean-Charles's father, which wereincredibly fresh for their age andextraordinarily complex and satisfying.The new wines, particularly since 2005,are some of the most piercing andfocused young Chardonnays I have evertasted. "While all vignerons talk aboutsoil," he says, "we don't talk enoughabout light." His west/southwest facingvineyards aren't the warmest, but they arebathed in sunlight from 7 a.m. until 9:30a.m. in June. And the wines do seemluminous.

The second-largest producer of Corton Charlemagne is the negotiant house of LouisLatour, which owns more vineyard land than anyone in Corton. The whites are verygood in most vintages; their reds less highly regarded, in part because of a controversialpractice of flash pasteurizing them, which some insist robs them of character. The rarestCorton Charlies are from Domaine Coche-Dury, based in Meursault, which owns a merethird of a hectare of Corton Charlemagne vines and makes fewer than 4,000 bottles inan average year. It's a truly great wine, and ridiculously expensiveat $1,500-plus,probably the world's second-priciest white, after DRC's $2,500-plus Montrachet. Almostas good, at a 10th the price, is the Corton Charlemagne from Simon Bize.

Although they enjoyed a certain historical regard, the reds of Corton have haven't inrecent years been as prized as the other grand crus of the Ctes de Nuits. They arefairly big and powerful, but they take a long time to come around and can seem rusticcompared with wines from Chambolles Musigny or Vosne-Romane. So it was very bignews when Vosne's, and the world's, most famous domain announced in 2008 that ithad entered a long-term lease agreement with Domaine Prince Florent de Merode for2.27 hectares of Corton. The courtly co-owner Aubert de Villaine, undoubtedly the best-


A view of Pernand-Vergelesses.

Enlarge Image


Grapes at Domaine de la Romane-Conti-Richebourg

Enlarge Image

Like Heath Ledger and Michelle Williamsmoving to Brooklyn, Romane-Conti adds a

Corton wine.



dressed and tweediest man in Burgundy, told me, "The appellation of Corton is one ofthe greatest in Burgundy, even if its reputation is not quite the same as it was in the19th century." DRC got lucky with its first vintage, the incredibly clement 2009, whichproduced wines of great ripeness up and down the Ctes.

I tasted the 2011 in barrel when I visitedthe domain this spring, and it was a richand powerful wine, notably more earthyand brawny than its cousins from Vosnethe famous grand crus chzeaux,Grand chzeaux, Richebourg, RomaneSt. Vivant, La Tche and Romane-Conti.Mr. de Villaine says, "we like the tannicconcentration which makes it a verydifferent wine from the more aerial andfeminine Vosne-Romane wines." (A veryapt and elegant description.) The wine isa blend of three different Grand CruVineyardsClos du Roi, Bressandes andRenard, arguably the three best. "Thereason why we did not bottle the three'climats' separately," Mr. de Villaine says,"is that we wanted to work only with theold vines, the young vines in eachvineyard being too young, in ourphilosophy. If we had 'vinified' separatelythe old vines of Clos du Roi, for instance,

the production would have been so small that it wouldn't have been merchandisable.So, we decided to make one Corton, each parcel bringing its own qualities and I believethe result is a great Corton with its earthy character and deep concentration." The 2009is trading for around $900, less expensive than DRC's other wines but way more thanany other Corton, except that of Domaine Leroy.

For now, it's possible to find bargains in Corton rouge (compared with other grand crus,that is) from the larger negotiants like Faiveley, Drouhin and Bouchard Pre et Fils, aswell as smaller domains like Chandon de Briailles, Dubreuil-Fontaine and EdmondCornu. It's also possible to get some really mediocre juice, so caveat emptor. But thisrustic appellation seems likely to undergo gentrification with the arrival of its glamorousnew star.


The hill of Corton

Enlarge Image

Explore More

Fall Wines: Go Red,but Light

A Brash Icon's SubtleWines Have Their Day

What Happened toNew Zealand Pinot Noir?

The Unique Charms of'Miscellaneous Wines'

The EverydaySommelier on the Corner

Mcon's AffordableWhite Burgundies

wsj.comDomaine Romane-Conti in Corton: A New Player Comes to Charlemagne's Hill | On Wine by Jay McInerney - WSJ.com

tFWVdPUkRTPWNvcnRvbit3aW5lAA==: form1: input0: News, Quotes, Companies, Videosbutton1:

Documents

drc-corton