Burgundies from Philippe Pacalet

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Philippe Pacalet has family roots in the Beaujolais, but as a winemaker he has settled further north, in the Côte d’Or.

For several years, he was the winemaker for Domaine Prieuré-Roch in Nuits-St-Georges, a job he left in 1999 to start his own wine company. Since the price of vines in Burgundy is astronomical, Philippe had no intention of buying land. Instead, he started cultivating relationship with owners of particular plots of vines everywhere in Côte d’Or, people who did a good job in the vines but did not always vinify their crops.

He was looking for good terroir and for old vines of the sort called “Pinot fin”, an old strand of Pinot Noir with particularly small bunches and delicate aromatics. This type is getting rarer in Burgundy since most new plantations are done with clones, rather than sélection massale.

When the owners let him do it, he took over the vine-tending, so as to work the land organically. He does not employ vine laborers himself, but relies on a professional company that provides these services. Another arrangement is to work closely with the farmers to ensure they respect their contract to sell grapes grown organically.

At harvest time, he hires his own team of pickers, and it is a race from plot to plot all along the Côte-de-Beaune et Côte-de-Nuits, to pick the grapes at optimum ripeness. There is also an excursion to Chablis, to pick the 1/2HA of Chardonnay he buys from a grower.

In 2007, after years spent between three cellars, in Beaune, in Gevrey-Chambertin and in Bouzes-les-Beaune (he shared space with Michel Couvreur’s whiskies), he bought spacious facilities in the heart of Beaune where he vinifies and ages his wines, and where his offices are also located. The building belonged to the de Montille family, but it was probably built for a wine merchant in the 19th century, around the time when the railroad got to Beaune from Dijon (1849.)

For better information, we humbly bow to Bertrand Celce whose wineblog Wine Terroirs is an excellent resource for Philippe's wines. He is also a professional photographer, a skill that eludes LDM Wines.

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