An impressive example of this elevated cru. The texture of the wine is beautifully soft and silky, with integrated, lightly gripping tannic structure. An elegant Beaujolais that bears the complexity of its old-vine origin. Find out more.
About the Wine
The aromas here are wine open, mixing stony graphite and dark fruits with a pretty lift of perfume. With Moulin-à-Vent generally providing more body and substance, here an impressive balance of muscularity and elegance is on display, with a fine, granular feel to the powdery tannins. Dark, inky fruits have a savoury, almost Burgundian character, with a lovely concentration that chisels down through layers of spicy fruit to charcoal and liquorice. Reflecting the cooler 2023 vintage, there is a pitch-perfect balance of structure and aromatics, meaning the wine is drinking incredibly well in its youth.
100% Gamay that combines four small parcels equaling two hectares in total, all of which Elisa has completely converted to organics over the last five years. Planted over loam-y granite, peppered with limestone and quartz, the vines are between 40 and 50 years old. The grapes are placed into large 5400-litre concrete tanks as whole bunches to undergo a semi-carbonic maceration, the grapes at the bottom of the tank being crushed under the weight of those at the top. For structure there are just two pump-overs before the grapes are pressed and the wine is fed back into concrete to rest for 11 months, with no filtration before bottling.
About Elisa Guerin
Unlike many of the better-known dynasties of natural winemakers in Beaujolais, Elisa Guerin is not being passed the baton of established family tradition, she is forging a new path. The Guerins, based in Chénas, farm 4 hectares of vines across the Moulin-à-Vent and Chiroubles appellations that have been in the family since the early 1900s. Elisa, a trained agronomist, is the first generation to break out to pursue her vision of chemical-free viticulture over these sites and natural methods in the cellar. Very much at the beginning of what promises to be a fascinating journey, in 2019 Elisa began the long process of converting the land, with the long-term goal being to have the estate completely turned over to organics. With a strong focus on environmental impact, the plan extends to diversifying the landscape and encouraging biodiversity with the planting of hedgerows and fruit trees, and to experiment with new methods of fertilisation, using plant-based extracts and treatments. There will also be some white grapes popping up alongside all that Gamay, with plantings of Aligoté and Melon de Bourgogne. She has begun with a small production of Beaujolais-Villages, from 50 year-old vines in conversion - the first to be bottled under her own name - as well as a couple of other cuvées from a mixture of small parcels in Moulin-à-Vent, plus a wine from the higher elevation cru of Chiroubles. As the reins are, piece by piece, handed over from her father, Philippe, Elisa is also changing the way the wines are vinified; fermenting only with native yeasts, raising the wines in concrete rather than barrels and scrupulously minimising any additions, seeking to create expressions of Gamay that reflect this varied terroir of granite, limestone and schist. The wines themselves are a real labour of love and make for compelling representations of the region; a precise balance of elegance, concentration and purity of fruit, with an underlying mineral aspect. They are, above all, a real pleasure to drink and we’re so happy to be bringing them all to the UK for the first time. We can’t help but feel Elisa is destined for great things.
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