Bourgogne Rouge Bedeau, Domaine de Chassorney

This is what natural wine is all about, a probing examination of terroir and the Pinot Noir grape in all its naked beauty. Frederic Cossard is another of those vignerons who work the vines like a sensitive Stakhavonite placing all emphasis on creating a healthy environment for the grapes. The vinification is equally sensitive with nothing added and nothing taken away.

The Bedeau teases as it pleases. The nose is very fine, almost restrained and yet certainly and pertinently Pinot Noir. It is reassuringly pale in colour and aromatically there are suggestions of stonefruit, flint and red berry and secondary notes of seasoned wood. The palate is lively and sapid, the fruit complemented and held in check by the stony elegance of the minerality. Overall the Bedeau exhibits regal poise and drive, this fluid Pinot sliding vibrantly over the tongue rather than spreading its soft, sweet charms to all corners of the mouth.

Natural wines – are they different or are we making an artificial case for qualitative superiority? Tasting Cossard’s Bourgogne Rouge, Herve Souhaut’s northern Rhone Syrah and the Pineau d’Aunis from Domaine Le Briseau, to name but three, you are aware that all the wines possess energy. They do not suffer “palate drag” whereby excessive fatness, sweetness, extraction, bitterness, alcohol or wood seem to hold back the very essence of the wine or cause our tongues to negotiate superimposed textures and flavours.