Burgundy Club: November 2026

Greetings Burgundy CLub,

This month's "village" level club is extra spectacular, featuring a near-Meursault and a 1er Cru Monopole red from the Cote de Nuits. With the changing seasons we're in the best 12 months of the year to drink Burgundy, and neither of these wines will punish you for drinking them soon - just pop and enjoy!

White Wine: Domaine Rougeot Bourgogne Côte d'Or La Monatine 2023

We visited Domaine Rougeot on our last trip to Burgundy, where we met Pierre-Henri Rougeot, a soft-spoken, thoughtful guy who's making some of the most interesting minimally intervened wines in Meursault. His approach to sulfur is particularly interesting. He tries to make every wine without adding any, but tastes the barrels throughout élevage and isn't afraid to add a little sulfur when a wine needs it. The barrels that make it all the way through without additions get his distinctive slanted green and white label, while those that need a little help get the classic label, like the bottle you're receiving. I really appreciate this approach; he's committed to making wines as naturally as possible, but not at the expense of making good, sound wine.

The Rougeot whites at the domaine. The slanted green-and-white labels made it through élevage with no added sulfur; the classic labels got a little help.

La Monatine is a single vineyard at the bottom of Meursault, just a few meters from the village-level vineyard Sous la Velle. It's technically Bourgogne Côte d'Or, a more geographically specific designation than regular Bourgogne, but the vines are practically neighbors with Meursault AOC. The clay-limestone soils here are a bit heavier than those farther up the slope, giving the wine some of that richness and generosity we love in Meursault.

The wine is fermented with indigenous yeasts and aged in oak, but the emphasis is on texture and the vineyard rather than oak flavor. The 2023 has that lovely combination of ripe orchard fruit, richness and freshness that makes white Burgundy so enjoyable. It's a great example of how compelling these Bourgogne Côte d'Or wines can be, especially when they're coming from serious growers working just outside the village appellations. Don't feel obligated to cellar this one; it's ready to enjoy now.

Visiting Domaine Rougeot in Meursault, and the cellar's resident greeter.

Red Wine: Domaine Joliet Fixin 1er Cru Clos de la Perrière 2021

Fixin (pronounced Fee-SAN) is sandwiched between Gevrey-Chambertin to its south and Marsannay to its north. This appellation, in fact, is just recently expanded as it took some vineyards across the border in the town of Brochon which were previously classified as Cote-de-Nuits Villages starting with the 2024 vintage. It's a small village with wines compared to Gevrey but with more rusticity, and the soils are somewhere in between the old limestone and marl of Gevrey and the more alluvially influence Marsannay.

Red is almost exclusively made here, but there's a bit of white wine including the white version of this wine, arguable the top Chardonnay of Fixin. And the Clos de la Perriere red is one of its top pinot noirs. While this is a monopole, the family does sell some fruit, so you'll see other bottlings with the vineyard name though the entire cru is owned by Domaine Joliet.

Clos de la Perrière is a late ripening, high site, which in Burgundy often produces reds of deeper color than warmer, lower sites, counterintuitively. The winery uses full whole cluster and about 30 percent new oak for this wine, which does indeed show a darkness not normally seen in the 2021 vintage. The great thing about 2021 is that they already drink very maturely; the cool, wet vintage gave wines that seem to develop in the bottle quickly. I'm not mad about it - this give the mushroomy, savory experience with delicate & pretty floral notes that great red Burgundy balances so well with a bit of age. Pop and pour this iconic Burgundy sometime this winter; you won't regret it.

That's it for November - enjoy your holidays and the next Burgundy club release for this level will be January 1, 2027!