Our first acquaintance with the wines from Savigny les Beaune dates back to the early 1990ies. At that time, we found the wines over extracted and a bit rustic with the exception of the wines from Domaine Simon Bize and Domaine Maurice Écard. However, the wines from the highly ranked Domaine jean-Marc Pavelot (La Dominode and Les Serpentières) remained coarse and hard without fruit, and never became drinkable and worth the money!

When we returned some ten years ago things had changed – a new generation of vignerons had taken over, heading for a combination of intensity and depth, balanced fruit, in addition to sophisticated tannins. They represent Savigny’s with style rather than raw substance. If you look carefully, you can also easily come across village wines with plenty of charme and red fruit. In conclusion, we find that Savigny now is an attractive hunting ground for good, inexpensive Burgundy in both colors, however, prices have increased significantly here too.

Our first visit at Domaine Serrigny was on a hot Monday the 28^th of August 2017, an unforgettable visit which we will come back to shortly.

The domaine was established in the late 19^th century and is run today by Marie Leure Serrigny. After the sudden death of her father in 1995, Marie Leure and her sister Francine took over responsibility for the domaine at the age of 25 and 23 years, respectively. At that time Marie Laure had worked with her father since 1988, and before that her grandfather had taught her all the details and secrets behind the work as a vigneron.

Marie Laure and Francine shared the responsibility and hard work for running the domaine until late in 2016, when Francine died after a long battle with cancer. Add to this that hail during the years 2013-2015 had damaged the majority of the Serrigny vines, and the frost on April 27^th 2016 wiped our some 70% of the domain’s crop. Encouraging that Marie Laure in her Christmas greetings in 2017 was able to state “Le millésime 2017 est très prometteur, nous avons été très gaté par la qualitè ainsi que la quantitè, ce qui redonne le sourire à chacun”.

After le rachat des vignes de Bruno Févre à Meursault en 2016 (3 ha) the domaine presently includes rather more than eight hectares of vines with small parcels in Auxey-Duresses, Côte de Nuits Villages, Corton Charlemagne, Ladoix, Meursault, Monthelie, Pernand Vergelesses, and Volnay, while the majority of their holdings are placed in Savigny. A lutte raisonnée is practiced, and the approach in the cellar (Bought the former cuverie of Reine Pedauque in 2015) is quite traditional, as stated on the domaines homepage.

In the vines Marie Laure aims for low yields and as healthy and ripe grapes as possible. She is not afraid to wait for good ripeness. To preserve the quality of the grapes small cases (10 kg) are used for transport, and a severe tri is applied upon arrival at the domaine (up to 10-20 % of the grapes might be sorted out). In the cellar as little intervention as possible is practiced “Marie Laure s’attache à produire des vins fins, fruitès, plus infusés qu’extraits”.

Marie Laure is lucky to work with some very old vines. Her Bourgogne Aligoté vines are more than 100 years old, and her vines in La Dominode (1er Cru) have almost reached the same age, while the vines in Peuillets and En Bas des Duresses (both 1^er Cru) were planted in the 1960’s. The average age of the vines making up the Savigny les Beaune-Serrignyssime (Aux Fournaux, Les Pimentiers, Les Grands Picotins and Les Petits Picotins) is rather more than 60 years. The remaining Pinot Noir parcels (Generic Bourgogne, Côte de Nuits Village, Pernarnd Verglesses, Savigny les Beaune, Monthelie sur la Velle (1^er Cru) and Volnay 1^er Cru les Mitans vary between 30 and 50 years, the Meursault vines being young (15 years). With the exception of the white Meursault vines (40 years old) the Chardonnay vines are young.

Our introduction to the domaine was their website. There had been no press to speak of and promote the Serrigny wines. We were cordially welcomed by Marie Laure and her Beagle in the courtyard on our first visit. Tasting subsequently took place in the old and modest cellar at 4 Rue du Boutellier, and to be frank, we were carried away by her straightforward sense of humor and no nonsense talk of her wines. There was no pretense about her at all. We tasted her wines from two vintages (2014 and 2015) and returned on April 14^th 2018 to taste millésime 2016. Pretty exiting tastings. Marie Laure really makes killer wines.

The domaine was introduced to the readers of Bourgogne Aujourd’ui in the July/August number 2017 (millésime 2016), and subsequently, Bourgogne Aujourd’hui (No 141, Juni-Juillet 2018) rated the following wines from Domaine Serrigny (millésime 2017): Côte de Nuits Village 14.5/20; Corton Charlemagne GC 16/20; Savigny les Beaune 1^er Cru Les Peuillets 17/20; Savigny les Beaune rouge 16/20; Volnay 1^er Cru Les Mitans 15/20; Auxey-Duresses 1^er Cru rouge Le Bas des Duresses 15/20.

Having tasted all her wines from different millésimes we find it difficult to speak of our favourite wine, since they are many. However, we will surely always pick the Corton Charlemagne, la Dominode, and Savigny les Beaune rouge.

www.domaine-serrigny.fr