Coming Back Down To Earth
Written By: Brian Freedman on Thu, Jul 12th 2007
The Beauty of Affordable Burgundy
I recently had a bit of a wine revelation, which I hadn't realized how much I'd needed until it happened. After all, these days it seems as if most of the wine world is in a tizzy over one thing: Prices.
Sure, there's always been a certain tension between the juice in the bottle and the price people are willing to pay for it, but it seems as if it reached its most recent apex with the glorious weather that blessed Bordeaux in 2005 and then the (perhaps inevitable) release of exorbitant prices for the en primeur campaign that followed the reviews of the barrel samples.
And now, having come through yet another season of Bordeaux price-gouging—Le Pin and Petrus just announced that single bottles of their 2006 wine will hit the market at around 1,000 euros each, or more than $1,300—many of us in the wine business find ourselves in a huff as we ponder the ever-growing distance between the kinds of wines billionaires can afford, and the ones that mere mortals can.
(As a point of reference, Chateau Petrus released its 1998 vintage at $550, which is equivalent, with inflation factored in, to somewhere between $600 and $700 today, depending on how you calculate it. This, of course, is not cheap, but it's still about half of what a bottle of the 2006 will cost you.)
Which is why the red Burgundy I recently tasted was such a revelation. It was a modest Domaine Chanson et Fils Pernand-Vergelesses "Les Vergelesses" premier cru 2002—not a DRC Romanée-Conti, of course, but a pretty little bottle of pinot nonetheless. It had a delicious mushroom-and-forest-floor character, as well as the dried flower and red berry fruit notes that you'd expect from a wine with some bottle age. All of it was built on a silky-smooth, classically light frame that found the perfect balance between fruit and earth, lushness and acidity. This is what Burgundy is all about.
And keep in mind that 2002 was a fabulous year for Burgundy. So what did I pay? Let's do the math: Classic growing region, premier cru-level vineyard, stellar vintage, and a grape (pinot noir) that is notoriously difficult to grow and vinify. $100? $150?
Actually, it cost me all of $31.99.
This was the revelation I needed.
Sure, there are wines out there that are more profound than that one. And sure, there are bottles out there that I'd be happy to pay, say, $200 for. But the fact that this bottle of Burgundy delivered all that nuance, all that subtlety, all that flavor and elegance for that kind of money reaffirmed my faith in the wine enterprise as a whole.
Maybe it's the fault of the wine press, and the ways in which the blessing—or score—of one of a handful of critics can make ordinarily sane people clamor for a certain bottle the way children do the latest iteration of the PlayStation. Or maybe it's all the baggage that wine comes with—the supposed prestige that comes with pulling a bottle from your cellar that no one else can either get their hands on or afford.
Whatever it is, the wine world has been a bit ridiculous lately, and I've found myself rather annoyed at the direction it seems to be headed in terms of the gap between price and value.
But one little bottle brought me back to earth, and showed me that there is indeed hope. It showed me that there are still bargains to be found. And it showed me that the search is worth the effort. Because that bottle of Burgundy was damn tasty, and gave me a whole lot of pleasure.
For $32, that's a steal.
