Mâcon-Loché les Longues Terres 2022
AC, Domaine Marcel Couturier, 750 ml
Description
Marcel Couturier's small domaine, based in Fuissé, was recently chosen by Robert Parker as the new Chardonnay icon of the Mâconnais! This elegant Burgundy, from the southern part of Bourgogne, comes from vines over 30 years old that thrive on clay, loam and marble soils. Its inviting bouquet unfolds a fan of scents reminiscent of white acacia flowers, honeysuckle, Tahitian vanilla and toasted toast. On the palate, the Chardonnay reveals itself with a perfect balance of body and precise acidity.
Attributes
| Grape variety: | Chardonnay |
| Producer: | Domaine Marcel Couturier |
| Origin: | France / Bourgogne / Mâconnais |
| Other vintages: | 2023 |
| Label: | Vegan, Certified organic or biodynamic wine |
| Ripening potential: | 1 to 10 years |
| Drinking temperature: | 10 to 12 °C |
| Food Pairing: | Mild Asian dishes, Baked egli fillets with tartare sauce, Cheese board, Crispy roast chicken, Vegetable flan, quiche |
| Vinification: | pressing the whole grape, fermentation in wooden barrel |
| Harvest: | hand-picking |
| Maturation: | partly in wooden barrel/foudre |
| Maturation duration: | 11 months |
| Volume: | 13.5 % |
| Note: | Contains sulphites |
Chardonnay
King or beggar?
Hardly any variety of vine shows such a broad spectrum of quality as the Chardonnay. Its wines range from faceless neutrality to breath-taking class. It is an extremely low-maintenance vine, which explains why it is grown around the world – even in places where it probably should not be. The aromas of the Chardonnay variety are not very pronounced: a bit of green apple, a little hazelnut; in warmer latitudes, also melon and exotic fruits. The wines are often defined by maturing in casks. They develop more or less subtle notes of butter, toasted bread and vanilla. The grapes achieve their highest expression in their region of origin, Burgundy. Its heart beats in the Côte de Beaune: one might think of the plant growth of Meursault or Puligny-Montrachet. With their finesse and complexity, they can survive for decades. Chardonnay also achieves first class in some Blanc-de-Blancs champagnes. It additionally yields great wines in the Burgundian Chablis, and increasingly in Australia and Chile. A simple rule of thumb for pairing with food: When butter and cream are involved, you cannot go wrong with Chardonnay.
Mâconnais
Mâconnais: Chardonnay country
Around 7,000 hectares are planted with vines in the Mâconnais, close to 75 percent of which are Chardonnay. The Mâconnais is thus the most significant Chardonnay growing area in Burgundy in terms of numbers. Although it is the southernmost white wine area in Burgundy, distinctively light, crisp wines originate here. Thanks to improvements in quality in the vineyard and cellar, the quality of the wines from the Mâconnais has also increased markedly in recent years.
Bourgogne
Burgundy: home of the crus
Burgundy and Bordeaux are France’s most prestigious wine regions. Nonetheless, they are completely distinct in character: while Bordeaux, as the land of the chateaux, enjoys an aristocratic image, Burgundy has retained its rustic agrarian structure. Burgundy stretches for over 200 kilometres, from Dijon in the north to Lyon in the south. In a highly complex jigsaw of the most diverse of terroirs, Chardonnay and Pinot Noir demonstrate the subtle ways in which they embody their sources.
France
France – Philosophy in a bottle
According to French philosophy, wine should be an expression of the soil and climate. They use the word “terroir” to describe this. Terroir makes every wine different, and many especially good. French wine is regarded worldwide as an expression of cultural perfection. The French believe that humans are responsible for the quality of the berries, the vine variety for their character, and nature for the quantity. This philosophy can be expressed succinctly as: “the truth is the vineyard, not the man.”
