2020 Bouchard Pere & Fils - Bonnes Mares (750ml)

Bouchard Père & Fils was founded in Beaune in 1731 by Michel Bouchard and ranks among Burgundy's oldest wine estates, carrying on nearly three centuries of family tradition. Joseph Bouchard acquired the house's first vineyards in Volnay's Les Caillerets in 1775, and his son later expanded the family's holdings in Beaune during the upheaval of the French Revolution, adding parcels including the famed Vigne de l'Enfant Jésus. The Henriot family, also owners of Champagne Henriot and William Fèvre, acquired Bouchard in 1995. Today winemaking takes place at the purpose-built Saint-Vincent winery in Savigny-lès-Beaune, where more than a hundred individual parcels are vinified separately and moved by gravity into an underground cellar holding some four thousand barrels.

Bouchard's holding in Bonnes-Mares, a Grand Cru within Chambolle-Musigny, is a small 0.24-hectare parcel acquired in 1996, yielding a little over a thousand bottles each year. The grapes are hand-harvested and vinified in small batches, then aged in French oak with a portion of new wood, a process built to let the vineyard's character come through rather than the wood itself.

The wine typically shows dark fruit and floral aromatics, with a medium-bodied palate carrying the persistent, velvety tannins characteristic of this celebrated site.