Ask Andy about this wine

France / Burgundy

Burgundy is renowned for being a jigsaw of small plots, fitting side by side across the rolling côtes and crus, each with many different owners – the result of Napoleonic inheritance laws that divide estates equally between heirs. While some heirs want to make wine, others prefer to live their lives elsewhere, meaning that their plots go untended.

Enter Patrice du Jeu, a Parisian restaurateur with the dynamism and energy to revive such plots and also a descendant of the Saint-Genys family. Together with other members of his family and some of his friends, he managed to buy several of these neglected parcels of vines in excellent terroirs of the Côte de Beaune, including Santenay, Chassagne-Montrachet and the monopole of Clos Marcilly in Mercurey. Teaming up with white Burgundy expert Jean-Baptise Alinc, the wines of these heirs – Les Héritiers – are both technically highly competent and beautifully crafted.

The vines on this 13-hectare estate are grown sustainably, with very limited use of phytosanitary chemicals and preferring tillage to herbicides. Harvest is done by hand, directly into small drilled boxes, avoiding the maceration of grapes before winemaking and limiting the amount of handling and crushing.