Jean-Marc Millot Savigny-les-Beaune 2021

The Savigny-lès-Beaune holds a distinctive place in the Jean-Marc Millot range — it is the only Côte de Beaune appellation in a portfolio otherwise rooted entirely in Vosne-Romanée and the Côte de Nuits. The wine is a blend of three plots — Les Fourches near Aloxe-Corton, and Dessus les Vermots and Les Gollardes, both at altitude near the exit of the combe — a marriage that brings real balance between strength and maturity from the clay soils of Les Fourches and freshness and flexibility from the sandy, higher-altitude Vermots and Gollardes. Alix Millot, who has steadily taken over winemaking from her father, applies the same low-intervention, terroir-first philosophy here as across the rest of the domaine — native yeasts, minimal extraction, traditional Burgundian oak. 

Across vintages this is a wine of lift and immediacy rather than weight — the cooler, sandier component parcels keeping it on the lighter, more aromatic end of the Millot range. More spicy and vivid with energy, drinking well with enjoyable depth and length for the level — a fine, vivid character. In riper vintages it turns lively and spicy with a hint of grapefruit and lingonberry, intense and quite densely knit on the palate with beautifully perfumed fruit, while cooler years bring out fresh notes of rhubarb, with lovely coolness, freshness and energy on the palate.