Eight generations (and counting) of the Guillemot family have held the reigns of the family domaine. In a post-Enron world, the average member of Gen-Y might switch careers a dozen times. A career calling has become a rarity. A family calling – the type of epic, multi-generational commitment we have here – has become a window into the past.
Much about the Guillemot family’s wines seems to resist time. Their cramped, seemingly ancient cellar stretches out into the darkness under Savigny-lès-Beaune. There you can witness a different sort of family history. History under a cork, in stacks of unlabeled bottles – row upon row, vintage after vintage until the darkness swallows them up. The family’s techniques, too, seem out of time – their wines are fermented in large old demi-muid – enormous 600 liter barrels that demonstrate a resistance to conform to trends, an unwillingness to capitulate just to make the sale. While plenty of other producers in the area whack their wines with an enormous concentration of new oak, Guillemot uses none. The Domaine is interested in one thing: bottling pinot noir that gracefully represents Savigny-lès-Beaune.
These are wines for the ages. Earlier this year, Jean-Pierre Guillemot poured me a taste of Savigny-lès-Beaune Serpentières from 1976. It was one of the single most stunning wines I have tasted. Soft, perfumed, still vibrant. I tried my best to capture what I was experiencing, and ended up with a page of hasty scrawl that read more like a rip-off of Proust than a tasting note. I’m sure that the Serpentières represents one the greatest values to be had in Burgundy. I promised myself that I wouldn’t let a vintage pass without putting a case of it in my cellar. A commitment like that comes with some serious concern. I needed a firewall, a buffer that would remind me of what I had in store for me I I could resist temptation for a decade. But it had to be a pretty damn good reminder. This wine is my solution. The second greatest deal in red Burgundy – Domaine Guillemot’s Bourgogne rouge. So, indeed, this has become a double-promise. I promise that every case of Serpentières I buy from this Domaine will also be accompanied by a case of Bourgogne rouge.
If you lost a bottle or two of the Guillemot Bourgogne rouge in your basement, and uncovered them in a few years, you would no doubt be very happy with the contents. This is one of the few truly killer bottles of Pinot Noir you can have for less than twenty bucks. But you don’t have to wait. Not too long, anyway. Dump a bottle of this wine into a decanter. Give it about a half an hour. The results are wild – a perfumed nose of red cherry and strawberry, candied orange and rose, underpinned by just a bit of earthy funk. The first sip is a bit tart – mouthwatering, bright cranberry and red cherry show up in the first wave of flavor. There are other layers – interesting layers – to be uncovered. There’s a tangerine and grapefruit mist that floats above the red fruit. On the back end, the wine leaves behind a bit of mushroom and earth. This isn’t the concentrated muck that all to often passes for pinot noir these days. It is the real deal – svelte and juicy. Drink this wine with a perfectly roasted chicken. I like the recipe from the Zuni Cafe cookbook – especially this adaptation from the Smitten Kitchen.
