Jean-Paul & Charly Thévenet "La Roche Pilée" Morgon 2024

La Roche Pilée dazzles in the glass, a deep garnet red. Its striking gemlike appearance echoes in the aromatics—think blueberry or blackberry preserves. Bright, juciy and spicy on the palate, with lifted blackberry and cherry fruits, elegant, floral touches and a savoury, iron-like core. Lush and light at the same time, with a balance of soft minerality referenced in the name ("La Roche Pilée" means crushed rock). This is a classy, beautiful expression of Morgon taken to playful and whimsical heights. A fantastic example of cru Beaujolais.

The fruit comes from vines at least 50 years old at 350 meters elevation in soils of decomposed granite, which provide the trademark minerality. The organically farmed grapes are hand harvested before undergoing traditional carbonic maceration, followed by a fermentation with natural yeasts in cement tank. The wine is then aged in three-year old Burgundian barrels before bottling. The wine is neither fined nor filtered.

Located in Villié-Morgon in the heart of Beaujolais, just south of Chiroubles, the Thévenet family has been producing high quality Gamay for four generations. Since 2018, father Jean-Paul and son Charly have started making wines together under the same label. The Thévenets are renowned as one of the cult domaines in the infamous “Gang of Four” dubbed by Kermit Lynch, who have raised the profile of the region by championing low-intervention winemaking with the aim of creating terroir-focussed wines. Their philosophy is simple: take a step back. The Thévenets are proponents of allowing wines to express their natural origins with little manipulation.

The estate itself is comprised of 11.5 hectares of Gamay vines, some of which are up to 70 years old and produce low yielding fruit with serious concentration. The resulting wines are known to have a trademark minerality, which Jean-Paul explains is owed to the granite soils that allow the roots to reach all the way down to the base rock. In the winery, father and son keep the vinification simple: traditional whole bunch carbonic maceration with a spontaneous fermentation in concrete vats, before a further 8-10 months ageing in concrete. At bottling, the wine is neither fined nor filtered and small amounts of sulphur are only added when necessary.