Sarnin-Berrux: Burgundy Sans Compromise

A Burgundy Original

It’s been too long since we’ve had access to the burgundy wines of Sarnin-Berrux. The hands-on duo are early trailblazers in Burgundy of producing wine with minimal intervention - from the ground, to the grape, to the bottle, to you.

Truth be told, when we first visited Jean-Pascal Sarnin and Jean-Marie Berrux in Saint-Romain in 2011, they were way ahead of today’s fully respected winemaking curve (in traditional Burgundy no less) for producing organically, sustainable and “natural” wine.

Jean-Pascal Sarnin describes their philosophy:

“Focused on sustainable development and respect for the environment, we strive to produce high quality, natural and lively wines from grapes that we buy from organic winegrowers. Our wines are produced in a traditional and ancestral way but with the help of modern technology: thus, we respect the grapes as much as possible, we limit handling the grapes by utilizing modern equipment, and continue on the path of minimal intervention by not using any oenological product (except the addition of a small dose of sulfites before bottling).”

What we most love about the Sarnin-Berrux wines is that they are earthy, living wines: they taste fresh, clean, fruity and so alive. And they are alive! As Jean-Pascal recently told us, “We make our wines as naturally as possible. We don't filter them, we do not use chemicals, we work only with grapes farmed organically and we use only the tiniest amount of sulfur in our wines. We are looking for purity."
(See our full producer profile below. Notes refer to prior bottlings. To our knowledge as of now, the wines are not available in the US.)

SARNIN-BERRUX "ALIGOTE" 2019
From hand-picked grapes with no additives to the wine, this rare white Burgundian grape is feisty, fresh, dry and alive. What's that thing about "lightning in a bottle"? Aligoté, the crisp and refreshing white grape, is one of three white grapes allowed to be grown in Chardonnay-centric Burgundy. Produced in tiny quantities in the region (Chardonnay brings in the big bucks, not Aligoté or Pinot Blanc), well made bottlings had been rare, real treats. Over the last seven to ten years, Aligoté has been enjoying a true and deserved renaissance with hallmark bottles going for upwards of sixty dollars a bottle. We think the demand for the grape and its recognition will only continue to rise. Dry and airy, the Aligoté packs a nice punch per dollar; try with white meat, sea food, some kung pao chicken or a zesty New England chowdah. (only two cases available) Sold out

SARNIN-BERRUX "BOURGOGNE BLANC" 2018
The non-intervention, terroir adjectives pile up (like the luxuriant fruit and flavor of this wine): biodynamic, unfined, clay and limestone, old oak, low sulphites, unfiltered, hand-picked grapes, nothing added... Spicy, fleshy and with a stony backbone, the 2018 Bourgogne Blanc is 100% full of life chardonnay. $48.00

SARNIN-BERRUX "CHASSAGNE-MONTRACHET" ROUGE 2018
Super rare and from great terroir. Many years ago, the first RED we ever tasted from Chassagne-Montrachet was a wonderful surprise, unaware as we were at the time that reds were produced or even allowed there. But why not? (Regulations do not allow for additional plantings.) The Sarnin-Berrux Chassagne-Montrachet has a refined clarity of dark fruit and minerality that is wholly enjoyable and refreshing. Earthy and complex, it runs a line of quintessential Burgundian character. Jean-Pascal says at the moment it usually needs at least a year to begin to open up, and when it does it will be rich, harmonious and complex. 13% alcohol. A wine to investigate before the supply evaporates. $88.00

SARNIN-BERRUX "VOLNAY" 2018
Lending itself so well to their style of non-intervention, organic farming and natural winemaking, the 2018 Volnay is nearly too good a good thing. With an often beguiling combination of fruit and structure, Jean-Pascal and Jean-Marie have created beauty in a bottle. The small parcel they work with is perfectly situated at the bottom of the village - very close in to Pommard, making for a wine of grand purity, with the elegance of “Volnay” and a hint of the burly power that Pommard is much respected for. (two cases available) $88.00

SARNIN-BERRUX "GEVREY-CHAMBERTIN" 2017
Generously bold with brilliant fruit, we'd start with the over-used, but in this case spot-on adjective "delicious", after which we will throw in complex, long and sneakily compelling. In 2017 these organically farmed vines produced a wine which after being open an hour and longer, touts a lovely saline quality accompanied by a rock-scented black fruit frame. For the price, it is a kind of Gevrey-Chambertin "essence in a bottle" and deserves your attention. (one case available ) $99.00

SARNIN-BERRUX BURGUNDY:
EMPHASIS ON FRUIT AND TERROIR

Maybe you already know the groundbreaking Burgundy wines from our friends Jean-Pascal Sarnin and Jean-Marie Berrux? When we first met them over a decade ago and introduced their wines to Oregon via our "almost direct imports" program, E&R's Oregon allocation was among only two or three states in America being able to offer their wines. The sharp Sarnin-Berrux duo's lovely wines are being labeled for us now.

Jean-Pascal Sarnin and Jean-Marie Berrux have our vote for producing some of the purest Burgundy we've tasted. Team E&R's visited them at their original Cote de Beaune winery three times (going back next month) and fallen "palate over heels" for their sultry, pure and magnificent pinot noir and chardonnay bottlings.

Unfamiliar with them?

Well, with good reason. Even though their production is nearing twenty vintages, their negociant production is minuscule. Jean-Pascal and Jean-Marie do not give their wines to magazines or wine critics to taste and give scores to. The Sarnin-Berrux wines are not fashioned to meet whatever the current trends in popular taste or high scores happen to be. They are not especially looking to export. In fact, on our first visit, Jean-Pascal politely told us they had no wine to sell. But when we find wines we love, we keep at it.

From 2011 (for perspective): “It was a surprise to learn that finding vineyards farmed 100% organically with grapes to sell in Burgundy is nearly impossible. As the Sarnin-Berrux team have learned, they are a maximum of ten domaines in all of Burgundy making wines naturally. In our view, however you slice it- no matter who is doing what or claiming this or that- the proof (taste) is found in the bottle.

WHAT THESE WINES ARE “ABOUT”

The philosophy is straightforward. To a degree, less human intervention ='s truer flavor of the grape and the ground, allowing those attributes to more fully blossom in the glass. Line up any two appellations of the Sarnin-Berrux wines and you'll recognize differences immediately.

For Sarnin and Berrux (who use their experience from working in the Jura for years in addition to Berrux’s own winery in Meursault) beginning in the vineyard, selection is crucial and vineyard management must be with partners wholly willing to keep non-organic treatments and pesticides out. Key farming decisions are made using the lunar calendar, the pressing of the harvested grapes is gentle and their red wines are kept in one cellar at one temperature while the whites are kept in another at a more appropriate temperature until the end of alcoholic fermentation.

In our visits, tasting one cuvee after another in the cellar, the clarity and individuality of the wines was clear. As Jean-Pascal explained their philosophy in greater detail "Natural wines do have a more pure taste and they are better for you health-wise. Sulphites are poison for human beings and our wines must be as clean and true as possible. The cellar conditions need to be pristine and absolutely correct for both colors of wines when using no chemical products which dwarf or kill micro-organisms in a still living wine, you must be careful... and as our wines do not have this protection, they need gentle care through the entire process and must be cellared always at the right temperature to survive and allow for the most complete flavors to show. All our equipment must be spotlessly clean and we pay a lot of attention to our tanks and each of our barrels."

When asked why their wines do not exhibit some of the brash, aggressive aromatics and flavors that some natural wines can when first opened, Jean-Pascal explained there are several reasons; first is the incredibly meticulous care and absolute cleanliness of all of their equipment in the winery and in particular their barrels (they are moving to even larger sized barrels with each new vintage). They do not use standard commercial yeasts to carry out fermentations (only native yeasts) which, for the reds are done in open top barrels with punch downs by foot. Each harvest is different and sometimes fermentations are completed between two or three weeks and sometimes between five or six, they let nature take its course vintage by vintage. Jean-Marie pointed out that both Pinot noir and Chardonnay are somewhat more difficult grapes to work naturally with (they also have grenache and syrah from the south... next year in Oregon!) and they do not ever fine or filter their wines.

Click each wine for more detail.