Théo Dancer has established his own micro-négoce sourcing tiny quantities of fruit from four special vineyards across France. Théo has always told us that his micro-negoce project is hugely important for him. It gives him the chance to work with other great growers; At the same time, he gets to explore other grape varieties he loves but does not work with in the domaine vineyards. 

From 2022, Dancer started working with a plot of organic, old-vine Aligoté in Meursault, and the quality has shot through the roof. It’s made the same way as the Vincent Dancer whites, with the fruit fermenting naturally with all its lees. There is no stirring, and the wine matures in large-format barrels over winter before resting in vat. It was racked just once and bottled unfiltered. As always with this wine, there’s lovely freshness and chalky drive to go with the generosity and complexity of the fruit. Simply great Aligoté. 

This cuvée is a blend of two great terroirs of the Mâconnais: Mâcon-Charnay and Viré-Clessé. These particular wines do not strike Verget as especially Mâconnais in style, so the blend is bottled under the Bourgogne appellation. In terms of the winemaking, all the wines are vinified in mature oak, and the lees are not stirred ‘so as not to mask the natural freshness of the wine’. With notes of yellow stone fruits, beeswax and sweet summer florals, it’s a fuller, more powerful wine than the Mâcon Villages. In short, it is a delicious, straight-shooting Bourgogne with a nice kernel twist on the enveloping finish. Again, this is a great drink and offers superb value.

Organic. This terrific-value wine is a blend from several of the Bret brothers’ parcels based in Mâcon-Villages, Saint-Véran and Pouilly-Fuissé, as well as the last 50 litres of each of La Soufrandière’s premium biodynamic wines below. All up, the vines average 50 years of age. It aged half in tank and half in older barrels for 11 months before bottling. It may only be the starting wine, but it sets quite the marker. With the emphasis on the vintage’s supple, fleshy fruit with some crystalline white fruit, it’s a classy, nuanced wine with terrific texture, citrusy drive and mouth-watering stone fruits. Every inch the bargain.

Négoce. Marrissou is the most northerly of Rully’s Premier Cru vineyards. Lamarche’s source lies under the Montagne de Remenot, at 150-200 metres. The bedrock is Oxfordian limestone under brown clay and stony topsoil. This wine is one of three new whites from Nicole; a Côtes de Nuits and Meursault (Premier Cru Charmes!) have also joined the portfolio. It shouldn't be surprising that Lamarche’s talent easily transfers to Chardonnay given her delicate touch with Pinot Noir. Lamarche notes that the Marissou vineyard imparts a beautiful balance of fruit richness and minerality, so in the cellar she works with very lightly toasted barrels and little stirring to support the wine’s earth-to-glass personality. 

This is only the third vintage from Domaine des Croix’s Combe Bazin, a steep, stony site on white soils. Croix’s parcel covers a single hectare. The vines deliver microscopic yields, and Croix is replanting most of the vineyard with mass-selection cuttings. The two barrels from 2023 come from the finest 15% of the vines.

The grapes were lightly crushed, followed by a gentle, three-hour press. The wine fermented spontaneously and aged for a year on lees in used 500-litre barrels before another six months in concrete. Croix notes that the archetypal Combe Bazin is a Saint-Romain that “fills out the palate”, and that is precisely what you get here: generosity balanced with juicy freshness, mineral chalkiness and coolness from the terroir’s altitude and shallow limestone soils.

This wine has been in the Bachelet-Monnot portfolio since 2012 and comes from four parcels of mature vines that average 30 years’ age. The key terroir is the lieu-dit Les Bras, which is a continuation of the Maranges 1er Cru La Fussière. Le Chainey provides the balance. These vineyards are exceptionally chalky and, in 2023 deliver mouthwatering tension with fine grip.

This high-grown wine is a favourite among followers of this producer (including us). Spread across three parcels, Leroux has worked with the same 0.77 hectares of vines since 2002 (before 2007, he made the same wine at Comte Armand). Les Vireuils is an east-facing, late-ripening site with pure, rocky, limestone soils and some flint. Leroux’s vines, around 45 years of age, are situated in Vireuils Dessus—one of the higher sites of Meursault sitting above the renowned Les Chevalières and Rougeots lieux-dits. This is one of the best areas for village-level wines in Meursault and it shows.

The Chassagne comprises six parcels, the most northerly of which is En Journoblot, which borders Criots-Bâtard. The core comes from three more centrally located vineyards: Voillenot Dessus and Les Chambres (under the 1er Cru Maltroie), and Les Masures (under the 1er Cru Champ Gains). The most southerly parcel is La Platière, which sits below the Abbaye de Morgeot climat. Altogether, these plots cover a surface of 1.4 hectares, making this Benoît’s most important wine. The sum of all these parts is a focused white Burgundy that again, bats well above its level. Barely 10% of this cuvee was raised in new oak.

The finest sites of Chassagne’s 1er Cru Morgeot (where 20 separate lieux-dits can be bottled) lie in the upper sector, above the main road on the poorer, white soils. Les Fairendes is one of these sites. Thierry Pillot once told us that his grandfather used to say that this vineyard—situated just below Les Caillerets—was the finest terroir within Morgeot (Pillot has no holding here, so we can take his word to be impartial). This wine is as far from your average Morgeot as you could imagine. It’s an incredibly mineral wine: chalky, driven, powerful and long. Real depth and structure, too. Brilliant.

This vineyard carries the local nickname Petit Bâtard on account of its similar clay-rich soils and the quality and texture of the wines it routinely delivers—both reminiscent of the nearby Grand Cru, Bâtard-Montrachet. The Bachelet brothers farm a 0.45-hectare parcel of 40-year-old vines near the top of the slope (next door to Sauzet’s) under Les Combettes Premier Cru. The soils here are very stony, which brings generosity and flesh, but there’s no shortage of mineral charge and chewy extract. It was raised entirely in 350-litre barrels, 25% new.

Working in and around Beaune means David Croix makes very little white, yet he has regularly shown that he is a master of Chardonnay with this striking, luminous Corton-Charlemagne. For several years, it has been a hidden gem in our portfolio. The fruit comes from two high parcels totalling just 0.25 hectares, both in the white marls of Le Charlemagne (above the historical holdings of Bonneau du Martray). These plots (alternately west- and north-facing, on both sides of Le Charlemagne) were planted in 1984/85 and 1988/89 respectively, and the vines have been organically managed since 2008. Both parcels are prone to millerandage, producing tiny bunches of ripe, golden berries. The 2023 fermented and aged in used barrel this year before being racked to Wine Globe for another 12 months. A brilliant example of the appellation: powerful and intense yet linear. Another stunning, supercharged CC from the ‘Hand of Croix’.

Germain’s small production of Chassagne Rouge hails from a small, clay-rich parcel in Les Battaudes, planted in 1951. This site is just below the Abbaye de Morgeot on the Chassagne/Remigny border. A proportion of whole bunches were included, and the wine was raised with only a small percentage of new oak. It a charming, lifted, perfumed red Burgundy with incredible finesse for a Chassagne rouge.

Along with Beaune Grèves, this vineyard shares its name with a Grand Cru vineyard on the nearby hill of Corton. It is no coincidence that these two vineyards regularly produce Beaune’s finest wines. David Croix’s vines sit high on the slope above Beaune at 300 metres on a 25-degree incline. It’s steep enough that Croix must cultivate part of it by horse. He is lucky enough to farm 0.88 hectares of mature plots in this legendary terroir, spread across three parcels planted in 1983, 1987 and 1991. All plots face east, on thin, gravelly soils, and have now been farmed organically for over a decade. The fruit was half destemmed and carefully extracted before aging in used casks. Although it has the generous fruit of the year, this overall is a mineral, rocky, earthy wine. A terrific wine to sit with, to sip and meditate. Give it air if drinking young.

Antoine farms a good plot of vines that are close to 40 years old. It’s just under a hectare, right on the border with Pommard. There is plenty of clay, and the wine is layered and hedonistic. It is the only red in our allocation fermented with a few whole bunches. It is a wonderfully seductive, Vosne-like red that is already gorgeous yet clearly has the structure to age.    

Les Mitans derives from the old French for ‘centre’, and this is likely the source of the name as this Cru lies at the heart of the appellation, on the slopes beneath the village. Leroux’s 0.65-hectare parcel is close to the Volnay 1er Cru Clos de la Barre and encroaches into the Mitans l’Ormeau lieu-dit. The soil is fine clay, shot through with limestone, which preserves excellent moisture during dry spells. The vines are 50 years old on average. This is a red-fruited, yet complex and savoury Volnay that shows just how great 2023 can be for Côte de Beaune reds. Power and finesse!

Thiriet’s Domaine Bourgogne Rouge stems from the same vineyard as the white wine—and the vines are even older. The vineyard’s name, La Sablière, refers to the sandy clay soils, partly explaining this wine’s beautiful, lifted perfume of summer fruits and red flowers. The vines are 90 years old, some even older, and Camille ferments this wine in concrete with 50% whole bunches layered at the bottom of the tank (so that any punchdowns and pumpovers won’t break the whole berries). Simply a stellar wine for this level: elegant, pure-fruited and vivid with a pretty, lacy structure and crunchy finish.

Alongside Longeroies and Champs Perdix, the Clos du Roy is one of Marsannay’s largest and most revered vineyards. Some consider it the appellation’s finest terroir, which makes sense when you consider the name: roy is the ancient French spelling of roi, meaning king. It’s a steep, east-facing slope above the village of Chenôve, on the same line as the Gevrey Premiers Crus to the south. It has lightish red soil, including some sand, over a bed of Comblanchien limestone. When Marsannay finally gets its first Premier Cru, Clos du Roy will likely be at the front of the queue. Pataille farms a serious 2.25 hectares in the clos, from vines planted in 1952, 1965, 1978 and 2001. As for the winemaking, ‘the king’s vineyard’ gets the royal treatment in the cellar, with 18 months in barrel and six months in tank before being bottled unfiltered. It fermented almost entirely as bunches (80% to be exact). Give it another four or five years in the cellar and wait for the fireworks. 

As all followers of this domaine will know well, this is Mortet’s ‘super-Gevrey’, sourced from a clutch of five brilliantly placed plots that Denis Mortet chose for the distinctive quality of their terroir and plant material. All the vines are at the higher, northern end of the appellation, which dictates the finesse. The vineyards include: En Motrot, situated between the church and Château de Gevrey-Chambertin, close to Clos Saint-Jacques; Au Vellé, very close by, under Petits Cazetiers; Combe-du-Dessus, situated at the top of the Brochon slope just northeast of Gevrey itself; En Champs directly below Gevrey’s 1er Cru Champeaux (the vines here are over 70 years old); and En Dérée, below En Champs on the Brochon border.

Only 20% new barrels were used, and one-third of the fruit was destemmed. This is simply brilliant and would have no problem passing for 1er Cru status (from a top producer!) in a blind line-up. Give it at least five years and you will reap even greater rewards.

Albeit with a barrel of 1er Cru included, 2023 is mostly the same blend of Les Athets and Les Chardannes as the 2022. These two sites sit at the base of the Chambolle hill on clay, silt and limestone soils. Leroux has once again sculpted an outstanding rendition of the village using roughly 30% bunches and 20% new oak. It’s pretty, perfumed, fine and juicy—in other words, it’s classic Chambolle!

This tiny 0.6-hectare monopole above the Corgoloin cemetery was the jewel in Gilles Jourdan’s portfolio. Now, Camille Thiriet wears the crown. The vineyard takes its name from the owner in Napoleonic times, and part of the site’s claim to fame is the rare outcropping of blue marl that imbues its wines with expectational longevity. It’s the only vineyard in the area with these rare soils. Camille told us she has tasted wines from 1957 and 1979 with the previous owner and was blown away by the quality. The vines in Thiriet’s plot average 60 years old, and Camille’s inaugural vintage fermented with 40% bunches. This is Thiriet’s most serious and complex wine: compact with deep, dark cherry fruit, roasted brown spice notes and fine, powdery tannins. Give it a few years and wait for the fireworks. In terms of the reviews below, remember that a 93 from Jasper Morris for a “village-level” wine is extraordinary and well-deserved.

This tiny 0.6-hectare monopole above the Corgoloin cemetery was the jewel in Gilles Jourdan’s portfolio. Now, Camille Thiriet wears the crown. The vineyard takes its name from the owner in Napoleonic times, and part of the site’s claim to fame is the rare outcropping of blue marl that imbues its wines with expectational longevity. It’s the only vineyard in the area with these rare soils. Camille told us she has tasted wines from 1957 and 1979 with the previous owner and was blown away by the quality. The vines in Thiriet’s plot average 60 years old, and Camille’s inaugural vintage fermented with 40% bunches. This is Thiriet’s most serious and complex wine: compact with deep, dark cherry fruit, roasted brown spice notes and fine, powdery tannins. Give it a few years and wait for the fireworks. In terms of the reviews below, remember that a 93 from Jasper Morris for a “village-level” wine is extraordinary and well-deserved.

This tiny 0.6-hectare monopole above the Corgoloin cemetery was the jewel in Gilles Jourdan’s portfolio. Now, Camille Thiriet wears the crown. The vineyard takes its name from the owner in Napoleonic times, and part of the site’s claim to fame is the rare outcropping of blue marl that imbues its wines with expectational longevity. It’s the only vineyard in the area with these rare soils. Camille told us she has tasted wines from 1957 and 1979 with the previous owner and was blown away by the quality. The vines in Thiriet’s plot average 60 years old, and Camille’s inaugural vintage fermented with 40% bunches. This is Thiriet’s most serious and complex wine: compact with deep, dark cherry fruit, roasted brown spice notes and fine, powdery tannins. Give it a few years and wait for the fireworks. In terms of the reviews below, remember that a 93 from Jasper Morris for a “village-level” wine is extraordinary and well-deserved.