Beaujolais
JEAN FOILLARD
“There is something no-nonsense and straightforward about Foillard’s wine. It seems to say, let’s cut straight to deliciousness. Deliciousness with class. It has a wonderful texture going down. The finesse from start to finish seems almost offhanded.” – Kermit Lynch
Early on, Jean began to follow the teachings of Jules Chauvet, a traditionalist who defied everything that the more commercial brands were touting in the region. Jean and three other local vignerons, Marcel Lapierre, Jean-Paul Thévenet, and Guy Breton, soon joined in on the movement. This Gang of Four, as Kermit Lynch christened them, called for a return to the old practices of viticulture and vinification: starting with old vines, never using synthetic herbicides or pesticides, harvesting late, rigorously sorting to remove all but the healthiest grapes, adding minimal doses of sulfur dioxide or none at all, and refusing both chaptalization and filtration. The end result allows Morgon to express itself naturally, as it should be without the bubblegum and banana aromas of so many other Beaujolais available today. Its rustic structure, spicy notes, and mineral-laden backbone are what real Morgon is all about.!
JEAN MARC BURGAUD
“Jean-Marc creates some of the best Beaujolais wines that you can buy. His 2013 Morgon Côte du Py Cuvée James is one of the standout wines of the vintage: tensile, fresh, full of nervosité and joie-de-vivre and strongly recommended.” – Robert Parker
Jean Marc started his eponymous winery with his wife and partner Christine in 1989. He owns all of his vineyards with the majority being in Morgon’s famed Cotes du Py (13ha). The youngest of the vines are 50+ years old. He also owns an even tinier amount of Regnie and Beaujolais Village. The vineyards have not seen chemicals or non-organic inputs for 10+ years and work is done my hand and horse. Vineyard density exceeds 10,000 plants per hectare. In the cellar Jean-Marc uses no adjuncts with the exception of sulphur at bottling. Elevage is almost entirely in concrete with the exception of old barrique for the “Reserve”. Vinification is more in line with Burgundy (like J.P. Brun) than what is ‘normal’ in Beaujolais resulting in wines of not only finesse but also sneaky power and amazing longevity in the cellar.