Jean-Louis Dutraive - Grand Cour

Photography and writing by Ted Vance.

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This extremely humble and hard-working vigneron has unintentionally become (for me) an iconoclastic vigneron within Beaujolais. He has found his own unique style of winemaking and has pushed his wines to a place that knows no equal. He has abandoned conventional farming in favor of organic many years ago and has become at one with his vines and his wines. He has come to realize and practice that with near perfect work in the vineyard of a great terroir, one must observe more and react less.

Fleurie is perhaps one of Beaujolais’ most elegant appellations. It, like the other crus of Beaujolais, is scrunched up in the north half of Beaujolais and are dominated by more the more complex soils: schist and granite. At Jean-Louis’ Fleurie vines, the soil is granite; the exception being the Brouilly, which is on limestone. The vineyards in Fleurie are spread out with quite a different elevation between 250-500 meters. The vines of Dutraive are just a short walk from the town center, which sits around 300 meters.

The climate of Beaujolais is semi-continental and is warmer than the rest of Burgundy. In fact, it is one of the warmest places in France during the summer months. Thankfully, they are the eastern foothills of the Massif Central which helps the vineyards cool down at night following hot days.

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Jean-Louis Dutraive - Grand Cour - 2023 Fleurie, Clos de la Grand Cour

Price: $51.00
Size: 750ml
Availability: 

24+ in stock

Type of Wine: Red
Grape(s): 100% Gamay
Style: Mineral, Elegant and Aromatic
SKU: DVFCGC23 Category: Tags: , , , Click to see what states we ship to
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GROWER OVERVIEW

It’s never too late for a renaissance. Nearing 60, the extremely humble and hard-working vigneron, Jean-Louis Dutraive unintentionally became one of Beaujolais’ iconoclastic vignerons. Between 2010-2016 (perhaps some years prior to those as well), Jean-Louis found his own uniquely elegant style that inspired an entire generation of local growers and extended well beyond Beaujolais and France into the global wine scene. Perhaps one of Beaujolais’ most elegant appellations, Fleurie is dominated by granite soils with a broad variation of altitudes and expositions. Jean-Louis’ Fleurie vines are on softer slopes at lower altitudes with deeper sandy soils than those at higher altitudes, which make for more elegant and aromatic wines. Jean-Louis’ Brouilly is a unique wine grown on limestone, which imparts more power, color and weight when compared to his range of Fleurie wines. All vineyards are farmed naturally with EU organic certification and most of the wines are bottled with little to no added sulfites. Jean-Louis’ offspring (Ophélie, Justin and Lucas) began to take greater stylistic control of the domaine in 2017, led by his daughter, Ophélie.

VINEYARD DETAILS

Vines with an average age of 60 years (2025) in a walled vineyard on a gently sloped plateau facing southeast in south Fleurie, this “monopole” of Dutraive is on gray granite sand and granite bedrock at 285-300m.

CELLAR NOTES

100% whole cluster, semi-carbonic, natural fermentation and maceration for 2-3 weeks and the wine aged for 7 months in 50% old foudre and 50% old 228L French oak. 10ppm (10mg/L) total added sulfites only at bottling, no fining nor filtration.

About The Wine

Inside the bottle: This exotic beauty is perhaps the most understated and rustic in Jean-Louis’ range. Like all the wines made by Jean-Louis, this wine finds a striking level of purity and focus after some time in the glass. It is the only wine in the range that spends time in old large foudre in addition to concrete. This elevage slowly softens the piercing aromas into a wine that has a little more rustic and sauvage (but clean!) character than the rest of the wines. It is a beauty and is always underrated in this line of brilliantly expressive wines. Jean-Louis uses different levels of Sulfur in his cuvées and this wine sees a single addition of 10 parts per million SO2 one month before bottling.

All of Jean-Louis’ wines are made with whole clusters, zero extraction and natural fermentations. They are made from a combination of nearly perfect farming and zen-like observation. The elevage of this wine is 40% in foudre and 60% in futs de chene (barrel.)

Terroir: Clos de la Grand Coeur is a historic estate located on a true plateau in Fleurie. This acidic soil is nearly 100% decomposed granite. It is the largest bottling on the estate, making up more than 1/3 of the production. Even at over 40 years average age, Jean-Louis considers these his young vines and bottles them separately from some of the older vines on the estate which go into the cuvée, Le Clos Vieille Vignes. Most of these vines are on more shallow soils than the Vieilles Vigne bottling.

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