WOW – Wine of the Week, Indigo Burgundy Blues
Chateau d’Etroyes, Mercurey 1st Cru, Les Velley, 2020
The Appellation d’origine controlee, (AOC) Mercurey was created in 1936 and may be used with the red grape Pinot Noir and the white grape Chardonnay as varieties; red wine dominates the region at almost 90 percent of total production. There are 32 Premier Cru vineyards within the Mercurey AOC. Mercurey red wines are generally deeper in colour, more fruit-driven, and fuller-bodied than those of the other Chalonnaise communes. This is a result of both the excellent terroir and a more quality-driven approach to the appellation laws.
Chateau d’Etroyes
The Protheau family oversaw the old cellar at Chateau d’Etroyes for three hundred years, the estate covers fifty hectares in the appellations of Mercurey and Rully, holdings include 10 Premier Crus in five different climats. Such longevity is rare in Burgundy, the family acquired the property in 1720, when almost all other vineyards in the area were owned by monasteries, who had been farming them for centuries.
During the French Revolution (1789, 1799) the ‘Assembly’ confiscated all church property; religious orders and monasteries were dissolved with monks and nuns ordered to return to private life. Church land, (including vineyards) was auctioned off to raise capital, with the buyers being merchants and traders, most of whom had never owned or farmed land. As independent winemakers and negociants in the first place, the Protheau family avoided this fate, and their vineyards and winery remained in family hands.
The winery at Chateau d’Etroyes was built in 1930 by François Protheau, who passed away in 1955. His son Maurice took over and expanded the vineyard holdings throughout the 1960s. After 50 years at the helm of the Domaine, Maurice passed away in 2005, leaving the winery to his children Michelle, Martine & Philippe. The Domaine and château had new owners in 2016 – the Helfrich family – who resold it in 2018.
In March of 2018, the property was sold to a group of investors under the Vis Vires Capital Asia investment group. At the head of this group is Mr. Ravi Viswanathan, a French citizen whose parents were born in Pondicherry, India before they moved to France in 1962.
In April 2023, it was announced that the Bollinger Group, (owners of the illustrious house of Domaine Chanson in Beaune) had purchased the estate and its holdings. Their intentions for Chateau d’Etroyes remain unannounced and unclear at this point in time. However, it must be noted that the estate is now closed to visitors, their website is closed, and the domain name (online) is listed as being for sale.
The Managing Director of Domaine Chanson, Vincent Avenel has said that the acquisition represented an opportunity to consolidate the estate with the addition of fifty hectares of great terroirs from the Côte Chalonnaise. It certainly looks and sounds as if Chateau d’Etroyes -at least as a label- may no longer exist in the market.
Over the last couple of years, I have tried several of the Chateau d’Etroyes wines and loved them, particularly pleased that as the pricing madness all around them raged on in Burgundy, Mercurey continued to offer exceptional value and quality for the intrepid and discerning.
Dinner
Last Friday evening, at a superb dinner by chef Michael Pataran (at his new Indigo restaurant in Phnom Penh), I was most fortunate to have the 2020 Les Velley, Premier Cru, from the Domaine, paired with an inspired and exceptional dug leg confit, stuffed inside a poached Bartlett pear with moromi miso, roasted eggplant, cured pancetta, shimeji mushroom, shiso and sansho peppers.
The dish was divine, delicious and a wonderful accompaniment to the wine.
The Wine
Served at optimal temperature, the aromas were initially on the funky side, forest floor, wood spices, damp autumn leaves, tree bark, shroom, bay leaf and a touch of game. On the palate, the dark cherry richness shone as it seeped in and filled the front palate with a rich, ripe compote of cherries, strawberries, cranberry and plums.
The wine was plush and generous through the mid palate, before being balanced by some deft oak and fine, ripe tannins towards the back. As the wine evolved in the glass, it offered up more generous fruit aromas and attractive complexity on the palate. There was also some fine acidity and a lingering, seductive aftertaste of ripe berries.
This Pinot Noir was brilliant with the dish and absolutely charming on its own, probably the wine of the night amongst a particularly good line up of wines.
The dinner was stunning, a tinge of sadness creeped in when it came to this wine, surely too good, and too long a history to be lost forever to a corporate takeover. But finally, there was joy at getting to try it once again -who knows, maybe for the last time- but in a perfect setting, with a fitting dish and in very fine company, now just a sweet, sweet memory.
92/100
Darren Gall
