“L’autoroute du Soleil,” or “the Sunshine Route,” begins in Paris and runs all the way down to Marseille by way of Beaune and Lyon. It connects some of the wine world’s most fabled villages like a string of pearls. Hop in a Peugeot on the outskirts of Paris, and you’ll be zipping through the vineyards of Chablis in less than two hours (depending on how well you drive stick).
This is the destination of today’s joyride: the sleepy, time-worn village home to the world’s purest expressions of Chardonnay. Pure, mineral, cerebral deliciousness. Ask any winemaker what they’re drinking at the end of the day and it’s probably beer or white Burgundy. But the wine world seems to have taken Chablis for granted in recent years. It’s a region so classic that it gets overlooked, so universally recognized that it sometimes feels like a peripheral part of the conversation about Burgundy. The upside is that prices remain lower than the Côte d’Or, while quality abounds if you know where to look. Today’s pitch-perfect (and bargain-priced) 2017 from Alain Geoffroy is Exhibit A. It is about as flawless as one could expect from a Chablis at this price. Stock up and drink it often!
Domaine Alain Geoffroy has crafted letter-perfect white Burgundy since the mid 1800s. Five generations later, they’re farming 50 hectares of mature vines, the youngest of which average about 20 years and the oldest of which are just north of 60. Ultimately, it’s wines like Domaine Geoffroy’s Chablis 2017 that keep the region relevant and competitive in the world of fine wine—they’re so dependably alive they wake up the palate and spirit alike, reminding you why you fell in love with Chardonnay in the first place. And if you haven’t yet mined the pleasures of white Burgundy, this is the perfect opportunity to try a dictionary-definition bottle from a classic producer determined to be as “Chablis” as possible.
The region of Chablis is one of the oldest in French winemaking history. It encompasses 17 communes entitled to the Chablis AOP, and about 8,800 planted acres. One could argue that Chablis articulates terroir with a greater transparency than any other wine region in the world. The wines produced here capture the nuances of land with a startling clarity which necessitates perfect focus on the part of grape-grower and winemaker alike. Soils are rich and porous, allowing deep rooting of dry-farmed vines in beautiful Kimmeridgian marl riddled with the imprints of tiny, ancient oyster shells. Like most classic Chablis producers, Domaine Geoffroy credits the aromatic richness and intense mineral content of their wines to these unusual soils.
Everything Geoffroy does in the winery is designed to translate the individual character of the vineyard with perfect accuracy. It’s a straightforward process, with little to no room for error when the entire region depends on a single grape variety in a climate prone to frost, hail, and mildew. This is winemaking on a razor’s edge. And sure enough, the 2017 vintage was hard-hit for the second year in a row by nasty frosts. These came in the spring, lasted about a week, and temperatures plummeted to -7 degrees Celsius. Thankfully, the rest of the season was less traumatic and sugar accumulated steadily, if slowly. As a result, it was a more leisurely harvest with less fruit to pick and exaggeratedly meticulous sorting of fruit for perfect quality.
The 2017 Chablis is a pale, luminous gold with greenish glints in the glass. The wine is bottled with a screwcap, an intelligent choice considering it’s drinking beautifully right this very moment, and will continue to be fresh and alive for the next seven years without the fear of cork taint or oxidation to haunt its stay in your cellar. The nose is rich and ripe: lemon curd, honeycomb, and struck flint, Granny-Smith apple on the palate. There’s a certain school of thought that believes Chablis should always be a tiny bit mean, a tiny bit...difficult. It’s amazing how perfectly this wine encapsulates that thought without sacrificing one ounce of pleasure. It’s the structure that really shines. Gorgeous, savory, firm, and spring-loaded with a sharp minerality, barely softened by the creaminess of lees contact. Acidity is perfectly balanced, your mouth waters and you’re already reaching for the next sip. We drank this with enormous farmers market tomatoes, thinly sliced over a pillow of fresh ricotta spread on rosemary sea-salt bread, all eaten over the sink, with tomato juice and Chablis dripping down our chins. Pretty great! Enjoy!
