2018 Louis Jadot Fixin

2018 Louis Jadot Fixin

2018 Louis Jadot Fixin, Pinot Noir from Burgundy, France

With solid tannic and acidic structure, Fixin is a wine of power, able to mature for five to eight years in the bottle.

Pairs well with traditional Burgundian fare: coq au vin, boeuf bourguignon, hare, game and other strongly flavored dishes.

Thin-skinned, finicky and temperamental, Pinot Noir is also one of the most rewarding grapes to grow and remains a labor of love for some of the greatest vignerons in Burgundy. Fairly adaptable but highly reflective of the environment in which it is grown, Pinot Noir prefers a cool climate and requires low yields to achieve high quality. Outside of France, outstanding examples come from in Oregon, California and throughout specific locations in wine-producing world.

Louis Jadot is one of Burgundy’s most important negociants, both qualitatively and quantitatively, with a portfolio that covers everything from inexpensive Bourgogne and Beaujolais wines to several grand cru wines, from the Côte de Beaune to Chablis. Unsurprisingly, Pinot Noir and Chardonnay feature heavily in the portfolio.

The house was founded in Beaune in 1859 by Louis Jadot, although the first vineyard – Clos de Ursules – was purchased in the 1820s. The headquarters remains in Beaune, although vineyard holdings have increased exponentially.

Fixin is a village at the northern end of the Côte de Nuits sub-region of Burgundy, known principally for red wines from the Pinot Noir grape variety. Apart from its neighbor Marsannay, it has the most northerly village appellation in the Côte de Nuits, covering roughly 90 hectares (220 acres) of vineyards spread evenly between Fixin itself and its southern neighbor, Brochon.

The style of wine produced in Fixin and Brochon is not dissimilar to that of neighboring Gevrey-Chambertin, being full flavored and well structured if not quite as complex or deeply perfumed. The reputation of Fixin wines has yet to reach the heights of any of the other Côte de Nuits villages, meaning that they do not command such high prices. Given that Fixin wines are often compared to those of more-prestigious communes, they represent an affordable introduction to the red wines of Burgundy.