This southernmost area of the Burgundy region was until a few years ago, mainly regarded as a place to get decent, good-drinking, well-priced wine, especially white. It is still true. But as prices in the top Burgundy appellations are inexorably going up, more and more investment and research has gone on in the Maconnais to push boundaries and see how good wine can get in this more affordable region.
Eric is one of the leading lights of the Maconnais, based in the Cru of Pouilly-Fuissé and as far as I’m concerned, his wines regularly outperforms the more famous names of the Cote d’Or. His family has been around these parts for 8 generations, rooted in the steep, fossil-rich slopes beneath the Roche de Vergisson (above). Eric was trained by Jean-Marie Guffens, a living legend of Burgundy, and he takes his unmistakable, style of precision, purity and biodynamic sensitivity from him as well as his grandfather. His plots of vines, typically planted between 1930 and 1979 sit on some of the best sites of the region.
I know it’s cliché but Eric genuinely is obsessed about terroir. When I spoke ot him he could describe in detail the nuances of each of his plots and how it affects the grapes and in turn his wines. Everything is done by hand, using organic and biodynamic methods, with low sulphur and minimal intervention. His wines are aged typically for 10-15 months in old oak barrels, bottled by gravity and often unfiltered (and yet you won’t spot a hue of haziness in there). His wines are world-class and we want them to find a good home:
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