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Sub-region · France

Côte Chalonnaise

A more affordable stretch of Burgundy south of the Côte d’Or, with Rully, Mercurey and Givry.

continentalcool

About Côte Chalonnaise

The Chalonnaise makes recognisably Burgundian wine at a fraction of Côte d’Or prices, and is where most people should start if they want to understand the region without spending heavily.

Bouzeron is the one appellation in Burgundy dedicated to Aligoté, the region’s other white grape.

Côte Chalonnaise is a sub-region, not an appellation

No authority delimits this name or attaches rules to it. A named division within a wine region that carries no geographical indication of its own. That does not make it less real or less useful — it means nothing legal follows from it, and you will not generally find it on a label as a controlled designation.

Grapes

Wines from here

red

Red Burgundy

Pinot Noir at its most perfumed and site-specific: pale, silky, high in acid, and the reference point for the variety worldwide.

white

White Burgundy

Barrel-fermented Chardonnay from the Côte de Beaune and Mâconnais — the model every serious oaked Chardonnay in the world is measured against.

Climate

Continental and slightly cooler than the Côte d'Or, with vineyards on more scattered, less continuous slopes.

These are influences on how a wine turns out, not determinants of it. Picking date, yield, vine age and every winemaking decision sit between the climate and the glass.

Soil and geology

Limestone and marl, as further north, but with more variation in aspect — which is part of why quality is less predictable and prices lower.

WineHQ describes soil in terms of what it demonstrably does — drainage, heat retention, water supply, rooting depth — and not in terms of flavours it is said to transmit. Vines take up ions, not aromas, and no mechanism has been demonstrated by which a mineral in the ground is tasted in the glass. See soil and drainage.

Places within it

  • Bouzeron — The only village appellation in Burgundy dedicated to Aligoté, the region’s forgotten white grape.
  • Givry — A small, mostly red Chalonnaise appellation making the softest and most immediately drinkable wines of the sub-region.
  • Mercurey — The largest and most serious red appellation of the Côte Chalonnaise, and the obvious step down from the Côte de Beaune.
  • Montagny — The southernmost Chalonnaise appellation, for white wine only, and unusual in classifying most of its vineyard as Premier Cru.
  • Rully — The northernmost Chalonnaise village, mostly white, and a long-standing centre of Crémant de Bourgogne production.

What to eat, and how to serve it

Derived from this region’s signature styles. Each is listed separately, because a region does not have one serving temperature.

Red Burgundy

Serve at 14–16°C (cellar cool).

Try with fillet steak, mushroom pasta or steak with béarnaise.

White Burgundy

Serve at 10–13°C (lightly chilled).

Try with salmon in a cream sauce, halibut or scallops.

Sources

Sources consulted