100% Gamay

Beaujolais, France

As always this is bright, focused, and energetic - the fruit-filled 2021 Fleurie "Les Moriers" reflects its outstanding terroir with good concentration and a superb depth not usually found in the wines of Fleurie. In 2021, a vintage that displays attractive, forward charm it carries the scent of wild sweet dark strawberries and plum skin. It's very lush and vivid, tasting generous and fluid with great vibrancy - the vines average 80 years old, and 'Les Moriers' has been known as one of the legendary vineyards of the Beaujolais for a few hundred years and this is its best example. - Importer note

Given the similarity in sound, it might seem cliché or contrived to describe reds from Fleurie as among the most floral of Beaujolais, but they truly are! This is one of Fleurie’s signatures, the main way its wines stand out from those of Beaujolais’s nine other crus. Cédric Chignard’s Les Moriers cuvée is not just irresistibly floral, though. Despite being light on its feet, it bears a soupçon of savory smoke as well as a spine of minerality and staying power more commonly associated with Moulin-à-Vent, Fleurie’s neighbor.
     That makes sense in this bottling since the Moriers parcel—a historic lieu-dit that ranked as a first growth in an 1874 classification of the region’s vineyards—is directly next door to Moulin-à-Vent. A bottle of Beaujolais that bears mesmerizing finesse, depth, and stamp of terroir, and also happens to stand tall as one of the region’s great values? Put me down for a case! —Tom Wolf