Fleurie Lieu Dit "Champagne" 2020 | Famille Dutraive

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The Fleurie cuvée vieilles vignes lieu-dit "Champagne" is an iconic Beaujolais cru, very rare and highly sought after, from the magnificent Grand'Cour estate. Masterfully vinified by Jean-Louis Dutraive and hdi kids (Justin, Ophélie and Lucas), a wine with exceptional finesse and complexity, a bouquet of flowers and small red fruits. A cuvée that can be cellared for many years.

This Fleurie cuvée comes from the “Champagne” terroir located to the south of the Fleurie appellation. Large at 1.5 hectares, the plot is made up of very old vines aged 70 years and vines around forty years old. On shallow sandy soil on weathered granite, the place called “Champagne” faces south-east and culminates at an altitude of 260 m.

The grapes were vinified in concrete vats then the wines were aged in oak barrels for 8 months. Unfiltered, unfined, tiny sulphites.

About the Domaine:

This estate is one of the oldest in Fleurie and was bought in 1969 by Jean DUTRAIVE. He took over 9 hectares of Fleurie on the Grand'Cour, Chapelle des Bois and Champagne's terroirs. He also kept 1 hectare 60 of Brouilly from the family property.
Jean Dutraive, was joined by his son Jean-Louis in 1977. He succeeded him definitively in 1989. Now Jean Louis's kids (Ophelie, Justin et Lucas) are slowly taking over the domaine .

The grapes picked up manually are put in whole vats (neither de-stemming nor crushing) put at low temperature and saturated with carbon dioxide (without sulphite addition).

Fermentation takes place naturally without intervention (except in the event of a problem) until pressing. No oenological product is used, the natural yeasts of the so-called indigenous grapes are responsible for characterizing our wines. These are then put in the cellar by gravity to begin their more or less long aging depending on the cuvées.

The "Famille Dutraive" project:

Following the hailstorms suffered on the Grand'Cour estate in 2016 and 2017, Jean-Louis and his children, Lucas, Justin and Ophélie, began to buy grapes which they vinified at the estate. The grapes, selected by them, come from plots cultivated in the spirit of organic farming, certified or not. The wines are produced according to the same philosophy as that of the estate, favoring parcel vinification, without oenological input. The first cuvées produced in 2016, Cap Ô Sud, were made from Cinsault and Carignan grape varieties from Corbières and Minervois respectively. Today the wines are mainly produced from Gamay du Beaujolais on the Chénas, Chiroubles, Fleurie and Saint-Amour crus.