Staff Selections •Peter Plaehn
Seasonal Pick 2023
Claude Manciat Macon Charnay Sainte-Juste
( Burgundy, France)
Surdyk's Price
Burgundy’s Mâconnais region is a bit like Rodney Dangerfield – it gets no respect! At the southern end just before you get to Beaujolais, historically it’s been a bulk wine region of machine-harvested grapes sold to negociants. That started to change in the mid-80s, about the time Claude Manciat took over the family vineyards. When Claude’s daughter Marie-Pierre took over in 2002, she had already been making her own wine for over a decade. Her vines are older than most in the region, giving the wines a rich, plump concentration of underripe pineapple, green mango, and papaya that will seem a bit sweet at first but is really just ripeness not usually found in the Mâcon, and favors those lovers of California unoaked Chardonnay who want to get a bit French. There’s a backbone of acid and minerality, though, that is distinctly not West Coast. As an added treat, it’s also being poured next door at Sidebar as the most affordable white Burgundy anywhere in town.