At first glance, the multitude of labels and villages in Burgundy make the region seem like an impossible puzzle to unravel. With basic explanations and facts, it is however really quite easy to understand this area of France which produces some of the world's greatest wines.

Burgundy comprises three main vineyard areas stretching from Chablis in the north, just 100 km South of Paris, to Macon and Beaujolais, 300 km further South-East, not far from the town of Lyon, with the most well-known area of the Côte d'Or (the golden slopes) in between.

Burgundy's wines are almost always produced from two grape varieties – Chardonnay for the whites and Pinot Noir for the reds. The main exception to this is Beaujolais, which is made from the red Gamay grape. In earlier times, most of Burgundy was planted with Gamay until it was gradually replaced by Pinot Noir, which produces much better wine on a clayey, limestone soil.

Chablis is quite a geological area apart, situated on an open, exposed outcrop of limestone composed of prehistoric oyster shells. It is called the Kimmeridgian limestone. At the other end of Burgundy, Beaujolais is an area of steep granite hills with wooded summits, which are ideal for the Gamay grape.

The central Burgundy vineyard area is situated on a geological fault made up of many layers of limestone and clay pushing up to a low hill on the western side and down to the valley of the river Saône in the east. It is this complex mix of clay and limestone which is one of the secrets of Burgundy.

Burgundy is the perfect illustration of that famous French word ‘ terroir ', pronounced ‘tayw-are', which means the magic mix of soil and climatic conditions. Wine produced from two seemingly identical neighbouring plots of land can have a great difference in taste. That is what makes Burgundy seem so complicated. This is determined by the topsoil, the underlying rock, the irrigation of the soil and exposure to the sun and wind. Of course, the winemaker's skill will make the final difference to the wine itself. Something equally hard to understand is why Burgundy is crowded with tiny vineyard plots with different names. This is the system all over France. The country is divided up into a grid system and each tiny plot outside the village has kept its original name. The names usually mean something as simple as ‘the end of the valley' or the ‘big wood'.

History has also played an important part. The first vines were planted in Burgundy in the Roman times, but it was only in the fourteenth century that the religious communities of monks, who found that the wine grown on one part of the land was better than others, started experimenting with the vines. The land belonging to the monastery was enclosed by a stone wall called a ‘ clos '. To this day some of the best vineyards in Burgundy remain within these enclosed areas, the most famous being ‘Clos Vougeot'. Originally, the vineyards were quite large, but during the French Revolution in 1789, the religious orders and nobility were dispossessed of their land and everything was split into small individual plots, which is still the case today.

The average size of a vineyard in Burgundy today is a mere 4 hectares. The 50-hectare Clos Vougeot is split among no less than 80 different owners, which literally means there are 80 different wines, also due to the fact that the vineyard stretches from half-way up the hill down to the valley, so the soil's quality gets progressively better as the vineyard gets closer to the top of the hill.

As in most of the traditional wine-growing countries, Burgundy has a very strict quality classification system, whereby each vineyard area is classified according to the quality of the ‘terroir'. This is very important for the grower as the higher the classification, the higher a price the wine will fetch. It is also easily recognisable on the wine label.

The very top vineyard areas are classified as ‘Grand Cru' or great growth. This is indicated on the label along with the names of the village and the vineyard plot (Corton/Renardes/Grand Cru). Next comes the ‘Premier Cru', or premium growth, showing the name of the village and sometimes the name of the plot (Nuits St.Georges/Premier Cru). A wine in the third level bears the name of only the village (for instance, Savigny les Beaune). The final category is simply called ‘Bourgogne', or Burgundy, white or red.

Every grower has to ensure that a wine is worthy of its classification from year to year and quality control is carried out regularly at various stages to see that every wine is up to the high levels required, otherwise it risks being declassified.

Almost all the vineyards are hand-harvested in Burgundy, for great care has to be taken not to damage the grapes. The whites are pressed very gently in pneumatic presses and the entire fermentation process is carried out at a carefully controlled temperature. The most important thing is to rid the wine of dead yeast cells and keep the fruit aromas intact, leaving the wine as fresh and clean as possible – without any excessive filtering, which filters out part of the flavour.

Most Burgundy whites, such as Chablis, Macon and Pouilly Fuissé, are best left fruity and fresh for drinking young and do not benefit from oak-ageing, which masks the fruit flavours of the Chardonnay. This is however not the case with the wines classified as Grand Cru, which are generally very rich, concentrated and complex, and benefit from oak, which adds extra complexity and depth to wines. In the Premier Cru category, the choice is left to growers. They have to take a call on whether particular wines are best left fresh and fruity or need extra complexity. One should also remember that aging a wine in oak is a costly, time-consuming process and will only make it more expensive.

Pinot Noir is very light in colour and doesn't produce a very deep red wine, but more often a bright, garnet colour, which does vary according to the area in which it is grown. The flavours are also very delicate and elegant, quite unlike most other red grapes.

They are not pressed, but only slightly crushed after harvesting, because this facilitates the fermentation process. They are then left to ferment in vats so that the maximum concentration of delicate flavours can be extracted.

Traditionally, the grapes that float to the top of the vat are pushed slightly down several times during fermentation to release more flavour. The juice is run off and, depending on the quality level, the wine is aged in oak for a certain length of time.

As with white wines, red wines are not all aged in oak and, indeed, this does not always benefit the wine. Neither is the wine aged in the same barrels, as the oak has quite a marked influence on the wine according to whether it is new or has been used several times. The wood of a new barrel will release strong, aggressive tannins and this becomes more subtle each time it is used. It is quite a common practice to age a third of a wine in new oak, a third in oak that has been used once and the last third in an older barrel.

The three wines are then blended together to create greater harmony and subtle flavours. As with Burgundy whites, the higher up the quality scale a wine is, the more concentrated are the flavours and the more they will benefit from extended oak aging, sometimes for as long as 18 months.

The other well-known Burgundy grape is the Gamay, grown in Beaujolais. This is a much darker grape, rich and dense, which produces lively, fruity wines that are best for drinking when young. Beaujolais is made in a very specific way called carbonic maceration. The grapes are left to ferment in the vats without any form of crushing or pressing. They ferment from inside the grape until they explode, releasing carbonic gas, which then goes on to assist in the fermentation process, producing the lively, fruity wine as we know Beaujolais to be.

-- Maureen Kerleau of Domaines de France is a Paris-based distributer of French wines produced by family owned and managed vineyards. This article is based on her talk at the wine appreciation workshop for young F&B professionals organised by the Indian Wine Academy at IFE-India 2005 in New Delhi.