Transcript for:
WSET 3 Burgundy Part 1

[Music] hello everybody my name is jimmy smith and welcome to the wine with jimmy channel um thank you so much for uh taking the time to watch this video um so this is uh part one of five parts regarding burgundy in france so we are going to be looking at the very complex area an area that has over 80 appalachians you don't really need to know that much for your level 3 but it is a complex place but we'll try and make it as digestible and understandable as humanly possible um so as i mentioned i'm jimmy smith of the wine with jimmy channel all of the social media is found at the bottom of the slides so if you want to get in touch if there's any comments questions or concerns please do this is our free part of the burgundy series parts two three and four will all be available to members only part five is already actually up that's chablis and chardonnay so you can watch that also as your own leisure okay so that's uh rock and roll through um through all of this so there is a lovely holding picture of the hospice de bone this is an old hospital which is situated in the center square of bone today it is a museum and holds the annual charity auctions it's a wonderful place that has this very tiled patterned roof which is quite common across the burgundy region it's quite special if you ever do get the chance if you're in london and do pop down to my wine bar called stretton winehouse we have replicated that pattern around the bottom of the bar so it's quite iconic and you know you're coming into burgundy when you start to see some of the famous buildings with their roofs and the churches etc have this tile pattern to it um so where are we looking here we are in france so uh burgundy is split over quite a large area encompassing sort of northern burgundy which is close to areas like champagne and ulion um it's up towards paris and then all the way through dijon bone towards leon in the southern section so we are firmly here looking at continental parts of france and that's going to be what we look at in the next couple of slides so let's go on to the next one so that is your burgundy region so you'll see way off in the northern area so north west area where we have um let's pop this up here so just up here as this shabbly arrow is pointing to this is around the city of orzaire and we have the town of chablis and its surrounding vineyards there are many other vineyards up here but you are just required to know this area for your wsct level 3. three on the left hand side it gives you a um a kind of an overview of the general macro climates that we find in burgundy so in this area in the north we find it being quite cool because the latitude is quite north here going up towards of course champagne so we have a cool climate here so general average temperatures in the um growing season below 16.5 degrees celsius and then as it heads down towards leon and here you'll see places such as dijon bone chalon and macon and all of our associated regions this is more moderate so around 16 and a half to 18 and a half degrees celsius on average during the growth season here but both of the areas all of this area is continental so therefore land locked not influenced well not influenced dramatically by any season oceans you will still get the gulf stream effect though happening across most of most of france continentality is quite extreme here that means differences between seasons so summers tend to be very hot winters tend to be very cold and you will find quite a bit of snow and there's also quite big diurnal differences here so these are the differences between the night and day so in a summer month you'll easily get around 30 degrees celsius in summer in the daytime and then at night time dropping down to 12 13 degrees celsius so quite big swings here this means that the grapes can refresh themselves from the heat of the summer day and kind of get ready for the next day by refreshing in that night that's really important for maintaining quite high acidities across the board so shabbly is at the top of the region there the coolest area exclusively for chardonnay and some of those real linear lean styles and very minerally in that area as we head south between dijon and bone the cities of dijon and bone we have the which is a part of what we call the coat door so let's um just put an arrow in here so this whole area the reddish and the purple area is called the coat door okay coat i don't have any accents on my uh my um laptop here so coat the door for the whole area split into the two zones so the one that's identified on the right is the the word coat means slope so this is the slope of numi nui is a town situated about two thirds of the way down that red area so two-thirds of the way down from dijon famous for pinot noir in this area and below that we have the cote de bone so the slopes of bone bone is the main city here in this kind of purpley area the kind of cultural center for um burgundy as well beautiful historical town a lovely old town in the center and of course that hospice de bone that first picture is found here as well so that is the coat to bone then we have a slightly larger expanse to the south of that to the west of shalon sur saun and this is the cote chalonnaise so the slopes of shalom and here there this is kind of an over spill area from the coat de bone the cote d'or and there are some good examples of beauchard named pinot noir found here the coat the bone is is mainly chardonnay it's about half and half but it is mainly um mainly chardonnay in that area and then finally at the bottom which is predominantly chardonnay is the mac on a just north of the city of macon and just on the border of beaujolais and this is a large large expense of some more simpler wines for the most part in this area i just wanted to give you therefore an idea of the location and as you move down that list from chablis to macon a you get from cool to moderate this means there is more ripening in the grape varieties as you head south so there is a marked difference between chardonnay and chablis and chardonnay in mac on a for instance you'll often find in chablis chardonnay they're very sort of linear green and by green apple like granny smith green apple very tart and things like minerally lemony characteristics in the macronee because of the warmth here and the better ripening you'll tend to find slightly more red apple or sweeter apple notes and things like a little bit of stone fruit like peach as well with some good acidities behind those so there is a diversity within this region which is um which is fascinating of course in in the one region okay so um that's really the macro climate of the area with a few little breakdowns there between the north and the south it is important to talk about weather hazards here though because burgundy is subject to quite a lot of weather hazards so this means we have some issues here and it's actually quite difficult to cultivate the vine in this region and so first and foremost rainfall now most of france and certainly most of of course the west but also the north and parts of the center of france are affected by the very wet and warm gulf stream which is pulled across the atlantic starting in the central americas pulled across the atlantic and then brings a lot of wet and warm weather to western europe so this can affect this area a lot of it falls of course on western france and northern france but it can be pulled across towards burgundy so we have we will have rainfall in this area it's not as much as say something like bordeaux but there is still rainfall throughout the year and the two specific times they would like you to understand that it's the most impactful is flowering so that is going to be around sort of junish time and if there is these june showers june rainfall that will disrupt flowering it may it may actually create very poor flowering um and lower the fruit set so how much fruit is produced from the flowering so this can drastically reduce yields at this point and then sort of fast forwarding towards the end of the year and in harvest time so september october you will find normally around september you'll find that there can be rainfalls around harvest as well and both the varieties chardonnay and pinot noir are subject to this and they do suffer with rot specifically pinot noir and if this happens of course a lot of fruit will have to be eliminated um because it can cause off flavors in the wine so that will drastically reduce yields so harvest rainfall can be a big issue then we have spring frosts both chardonnay and pinot noir which are related grape varieties are sadly early budding grape varieties so they are both subject to spring frost because they they run the gauntlet the risk more of being affected by spring frost because of their early budding cycle so these spring frosts um which can occur in april and may uh can of course cause a lot of issues within the region they can dramatically reduce the yields um big time of course and we actually go into a lot more detail on the chablis section about ways to combat about spring frosts but it's clearly in your textbooks about the major methods there are better sites of vineyards where are not so prone to frosts and they're on slopes it's one of the important factors of slopes but it can be an issue here spring frost and that can dramatically reduce the yields and then because of the continentality of this region there can be some localized and quite intensive hail storms hail is big bits of ice which is pelted out of the sky down to the ground at terminal velocity and can damage and destroy many things including cars and houses and glass panes and you name it vineyards are no exception they will be affected by hail storms and they can be damaged they can be destroyed throughout summer it depends on when exactly but they can shred leaves they can damage flowering they can damage the grapes themselves leading to splitting and rotting so often if it's such a powerful hail storm it will in fact wipe out a whole local area for vineyards and other plants so hailstorms can be a bit of an issue one way that this is combated against is that grapes are actually sourced from all over burgundy for certain wines so maybe your grapes are affected in one village but you do have grapes from other villages that you purchase or that you own so therefore it won't ruin the whole entire crop of your production your labels and there now we're going to talk a little bit about the layout of the land and a little bit about geology on here they don't go into too much detail about that for the level 3 certificate um but in burgundy because it is generally a cool area cool to moderate um the importance of slope cannot be underestimated it's very important um so what we have of course is many areas named after slopes so you have the cote d'or coated bone coat challenge etc that means of course they are dominated by some form of slopes the slopes all lie on the western side and the vineyards are on the east so facing east this is remarkably important because that means they are protected from that gulf stream from that westerly wind so let's scribble that in um so what you'll have coming across here is the westerly wind and that westerly wind is buffered and uh kind of mitigated by the the hills and the forests that are on the hills so therefore the slopes that lie on the eastern side remain quite protected from that westerly wind so that's quite important also the slope offers a couple of things it offers better drainage so when you have rainfall let's draw in a little bit of rainfall here as well so when we have rainfall coming down here okay now at the bottom of the slope by the village and the regional aocs are that can actually become quite inundated with water because it doesn't drain it stays in the tops soil where your root systems are in the premier cruise they'll tend to actually run down a surface runoff so that runs down the vineyard and gone crew they drain very well but some water is retained for what the vine needs so it has the perfect balance in that middle area hence why we find our very best wines like guancrew and premiere crew in the middle of the slope area so the mid slope is remarkably important for that good drainage uh the slopes are good for protection against the westerly wind and the third reason would be to do with aspect which i believe is what we'll go through next yes so aspect is the next reason of slopes so what is the importance of aspect aspect is our direction of our slope and so therefore which way it faces and here i've given you some points of the compass so we've gone from west on this side through south west south south east and east so this is just to give you an idea and specifically with pinot noir in fact about the direction of your slope now here in burgundy most slopes come from south to east so to this area south south east and east facing slopes and that's because remember it's on the east slopes are protected from the westerly wind so if you grow pinot noir on an east facing vineyard site on a slope um this will get the sunshine more in the morning which is a very gentle sunshine and as of course the the the earth is spinning around the sun it um it moves and the sun moves into its zenith in kind of the south and then towards the western part so easterly facing slopes will get more morning sun less afternoon sun so that means because the morning sun is much cooler and much more gentle as solar radiation the grapes will ripen but more elegantly more delicately so pinot noir on east facing will often be a little bit more um feminine they say or elegant and not so concentrated but they can have beautiful acidities a southeast facing slope will have a little bit more better ripening because of course it is now more facing south and this is remember it's just in burgundy so this is in the northern hemisphere so that southeasterly aspect means that there's a bit more of the sunshine around midday um and towards midday so that means that that'll be a bit more ripened and in fact a lot of vineyards in burgundy face south east then south facing we have some in burgundy facing south and of course this is going to get much better sunlight around the midday and certainly around lunch time when the sun is a bit more powerful of course and there's more heat and there's more ripening and solar radiation so these will be more intense if you were to then grow pinot noir on south west facing or even west facing more south west um which bits are in the cocktail like santanae they will have that very aggressive afternoon sunshine which tends to really ripen the grapes and in fact some parts of burgundy which are found on southwest facing slopes often critics label these when they taste them in big tastings label it like a new world style that reminds them of the more ripened sometimes dried fruits and much more concentration maybe less balance um but certainly more concentration so aspects certainly with elegant grapes and delicate grapes like in noir can have a huge impact in terms of the actual style so once again most of our slopes here face sort of east to south in our vineyards of burgundy so the key grape varieties now because we will go through chardonnay in great detail when we look at the coke de bone and other regions like the mac on a i'm just actually mentioning what chardonnay is good for here in terms of its production it is the key great variety about 50 of production and that's really because of chardonnay's popularity in the last sort of 30 40 years or so so half of production here and made of course in a linear light style which is quite minerally up in places like shabbly and can be completely complex rich malolactic buttery oaky uh in certain other areas and village commune zones as well so so chardonnay very very key great variety about a third of production is pinot noir and pinot noir is found mainly in the cote d'inoui for us but there is some in the both the coaster bone and the challenge and pinot noir as i mentioned really sight specific aspect uh slope um all of those have a dramatic part to play in the overall style of the wine both of these great varieties are old great varieties we have a lot of history behind them from this region they have also therefore adapted lots of different clones of these varieties so along with the site um the vineyard itself uh things like aspects and and so on and so on the clonal influences are quite specific here as well and different clones have different um adaptable characteristics maybe they are better at water absorption maybe they are better in more drought-like conditions maybe they're better on different aspects and so on and so on and so on so there's a lot of colonial types of both of these available in burgundy we have aligote aligote is a great variety which is a cousin of chardonnay and pinot noir but unfortunately it's kind of always been the ugly duckling and it's always been left behind bless it and therefore because it is the ugly duckling i have a soft spot for it um so what happens with this well aligote has had to contend with chardonnay for over a thousand years um it's lost that battle so chardonnay is found in our most favorable areas where aligote isn't alagote is normally on flatter land it produces more volume and often more neutral wines with high acidities but there are some good areas and certainly some producers are focusing on this great variety so if you do find it on favorable areas with good aspect and slope alegote and the good clones of aligote can produce really wonderfully aromatic and textured wines and so it's a bit of a jekyll and hyde grape variety due to the fact really of its um ambitious cousin chardonnay which is kind of over dominated it for so long and then we have gamay of course we have gamma gamma is a great variety which has been um populating most of france and certainly central parts of france for many years it's a grape that the aristocracy of old have hated and it's a grape of the people uh gamay yields very well often four times the amount of pinot noir and can be also left uh unchecked and left alone and it will still really look after itself it's a very um it's a very solid great variety gamete very solid vine here in burgundy because of course gamay will talk about in beaujolais more but here in burgundy gamay is considered just an early drinking style be found in many blends um and yes in more simpler burgundian wines you can find a bit of gamay but lights sort of gentle stuff okay so now we're going to go through the hierarchy give you some examples of those hierarchy and then we'll go through some questions uh some written short written answer questions so here is your um triangle of the hierarchy in burgundy at the bottom of the ladder according to what you need to know for your textbooks you need to know that there are some regional appalachians in burgundy such as burgoyne rouge and burgoyne blonde both of these are regional ones the grapes will be sourced from all over burgundy and they will generally be an introduction style or a simpler style of both red and white so burgoyne rouge and blanc they will normally be dominated with pinot noir and chardonnay respectively okay and often found on flatter lands you know places which will have poorer drainage more volume less concentration and so on there are some regional areas as well so the regional zones are broken into what used to be called districts now sub-regional zones and these are things like bourgoin so burgundy upper slopes of nui bogoin de bone so burgundy upper slopes of bone machon and macon village for instance so these are more sub-regional there's more kind of inherent terroir aspects to it and what which what we mean by that is uh te hua concepts really is you know they have specific locations there's a bit bit more of a micro climate about these zones so for example the bourgoin is actually on the top slopes on the upper slopes in the hills uh behind the very famous southeast facing slope of the cope de nuit this is an area therefore that's a bit more affected by the elements you know it's a bit more sporadic up there um and it can be you know why is there a bit more more concentration than a regional but less than a village level above that then um these regions and sub-regions are populated with villages a commune is a village so if the grapes are exclusively sourced from that village it can bear the name of that village on the label examples of this include chablis of course jeffrey chamberton in the kodanui merso in the cote de bone mercury which is in the coachella nays priy fusay which is in the the makone and then bone which is in the cote de bone of course and so they are very well respected they've been known over centuries and centuries so of course they hold a lot of weight a lot of people will tend to produce villages if they can village level commune wines within each of those villages will be sites of very good importance and they are called premier crew so you'll have on the label the name of the village the commune and the premier crew vineyard the named vineyard so the example they're giving there is bone grave and bone is our village grev is vineyard so these are going to be of course on some of the slope areas facing south easterly east and south with good drainage often around the grand cru areas and then the top one of course is concrete so these are the highest quality vineyard sites the best areas as we've just gone through uh within a village within a commune so you'll have le montrecha which of course is in the montreux villages le corton which is in within alex corton on the corton hill and the list will go on for these these are your most expensive premium and highest quality level wines and they are on the best sites best slopes best drainage uh and often they'll have a hell of a lot of history behind them you know been produced here for thousands of years so that is your grown crew level and to put it into labeling for you just so you've got some clear labels here you have a begoing pina noir label from chateau de drassi and that is from albert bisho and this is bogoin pinonua so it just means a burgundy pinot noir that is a regional label then you have a sub regional label which is albert bisho again this is cote de nuit okay so this is a sub sub-region as a part of burgundy so that's around the kotanui but all of the village areas around that then you have the village so albert bisho the von romanie is the name of the village and within that village you can have premiere crew sites of course and this is the named village and then premiere crew le marcon oh my gosh and that is the premiere crew name of that vineyard so you have the village level von romanie and then you have the named vineyard led marcon and then some of these villages but not all have gronk crew and in uh von romney there is rich boy and it says grand cru on the label with a grand cru it will not put the name of the village it just leads with the name of the grand cru so this says which is a very famous very famous one of course okay so that is going from more um sort of acceptable quality from regional to grand cru which of course is exceptionally high premium quality okay so just to wrap up this the next few minutes some questions associated to what we just learned so this is our working written question please remember that the success of your your examination will be centered around the written section the multiple choice is often done very well the tasting is often done very well but it is this written area which is often the most challenging name three weather hazards that and their effect on the vines in burgundy so how these hazards affect the vines in burgundy first of all a reduction of yield so this is an effect with summer rainfall that can disrupt flowering and harvest rainfall that can cause rot that is enough to get you two marks so in fact that's enough to really get you three but it's actually just two marks per hazard here so um so that's your first one which we went through earlier pinot noir is specifically susceptible to those harvest rainfalls hazard two spring frosts can occur up to may that reduce yields by damaging or destroying the buds now some of this wording won't be directly found in the burgundy section of your text what you are required to do and how you should link to understand is link something you've learned earlier on in the book about the viticultural aspects general viticultural aspects so it mentions in the book that spring for us frosts here can occur up to may but it doesn't say anything else you are expected to link it to earlier in your textbook which say reduce yields by damaging and destroying buds okay the general concept hazard three uh is the hailstorm so summer localized hail storms can damage or destroy the vines leading to a reduction in yield the same again the only thing that's mentioned in your burgundy section is summer hailstorms so you need to then add what you would learn earlier on in the course to that it's your understanding of the concept um okay so that will be six marks two marks per hazard in that instance next up is describe two reasons why pinot noir is particularly a change to grow here in burgundy um no immediately we know it's a cool or moderate area that is not a problem with pinot pinot actually prefers that it is an early ripener so please don't put down anything around the fact that it's pinot noir as an early ripener because that's actually a benefit we're looking at problems so pinot noir is early budding that is a problem because there is a greater risk of spring frosts which of course will occur in somewhere like april or may so the pinot noir therefore runs the risk of being affected by spring frost and reason two is pinot noir really due to its thin skins is quite susceptible to rot and yields can be dramatically affected by those harvest rainfalls pinot noir is quite subject to that so there will be two marks available per reason there and describe the likely viticultural conditions of a grand cru or premier crew vineyard now in your text they kind of group these two together grand cru is the best but premiere crew can be um sometimes better but they're normally just below in quality but near in quality so we need to understand what is what you would expect in the vineyard with these sites so first of all they are likely to be found on mid slopes where there is a great drainage and less frost risk because there's good aeration on a slope i've highlighted three things there because that will get you three marks in that one sentence mid slopes good drainage and less frost risk the frost wrist is mentioned in your burgundy part the drainage is something you should just understand about slope the effect of a slope the fact it will drain better in that area that will be found in your earlier parts of your textbook and the next part is in addition the aspect of these slopes will often be south to east so that's one mark there offering protection from westerly winds that's one mark and better but gentle ripening conditions as they are facing the sun or have good aspect towards the sun and that will get you your sixth mark okay now there are other things that potentially could be mentioned here but it's difficult to generalize so you could say often that the vines are generally older in this in grand crus and premiere cruise but it's not always the case you could also talk about clones um there are likely to be very high quality and suited clones to the specific locations so i think that actually that is quite a good thing to include in there it says viticultural conditions but the actual vine itself from the clone of the vine itself would fit into that it is not a human influence so much they are natural mutations and clones so that would be fine as well so that is it for this rather long section we're looking at nearly 35 minutes thank you so much for your time and attention i hope you found this very useful um parts two three and four which is all listed here will only be available for our members and that is available on our winewithjimmy.com so that's our e learning portal which gives you really great access to extra videos and so lots of members only videos loads of examination questions multiple choice questions over 700 of them uh short written answer questions flash cards revision sessions it's a very useful portal to give you more confidence as you go towards your examination so please have a look at that for the extra ones part five which is in fact shadley and chardonnay is already online that's available as free content on the youtube channel um okay great so thank you so much for your time and attention any comments concerns or questions please get in touch either through the wine with jimmy website or with social media at wine with jimmy it's been a pleasure and we'll see you soon thank you hello