Newcomer’s Guide to French Wine: The Burgundies

As a newcomer myself, I thought I would be deeply qualified to speak to what I learned about my favorite French wine, Burgundy. For those of you who like a deep and rich red wine, let's talk.

First, I have tasted a lot of Burgundies and I am not sophisticated enough to tell you what fruits and minerals I am tasting, just whether or not I like them. My determining factors rely more on the mouthfeel of the wine in addition to the taste.  You will see me describe the mouthfeel and then what I find the taste is to me. Maybe you will learn to think like I do and we can start our own wine club.

French wines are a bit confusing because you don't usually find the name of the grape on the bottle. Instead, it is all about the region where the grapes are grown. So when I talk that I like red Burgundy wine, I mean that I like Pinot Noir and that is usually grown in the Cote de Nuits area. I am also a big fan of Beaujolais, which is also a red Burgundy wine. Beaujolais is the Gamay grape. Many times these wines are for the celebrations, so they may not be the very best of Burgundy, but you will find a good, tasty wine for a reasonable price.

The flavor profile I often think of is dark red fruit, like cranberries or cherries.  The mouthfeel is thin but well blended, so the flavor seems to be everywhere all at once.  The Cru that best meets that expectation to my pallet is the Fleurie. If you are learning about Bojo wines for the first time, this is where I started.

I chose this Domaine Pardon Cuvee Hugo Fleurie to share because it perfectly matches the mouthfeel and the deep red fruit I described, but the fun part is that there is a bit of floral notes to it, which I find very appealing with food and as a sipping wine. It is around $20 a bottle and fairly accessible to most areas.  It goes with lots of different types of food and is a pretty red transparent color.  My husband and I drank it with the salmon dinner you see in the photo and it held up beautifully to the strong salmon flavors, although the more floral notes were harder to find.