2022 Louis Latour Les Champs Pouilly-Vinzelles Burgundy 750 ml

When spring of 2022 rolled around, the long-suffering growers of Burgundy were ready to catch a break.

For three seasons, Mother Nature had cast down as much springtime frost and hail as she could muster, decimating yields and leaving many fermenting tanks empty. But in ’22, the weather turned warm. And it held. Come September, tanks were full again. The quality of the year had one grower calling it “a truly magnificent harvest…Having some better yields and delicious healthy fruit made it all something we needed after a tough and tiny 2021.”

The place we’d start is Louis Latour’s Les Champs, from the hidden gem of Pouilly-Vinzelles in the Mâconnais. (Don’t confuse this wine with the more common “En Paradis” bottling.) It’s always among our most beloved bottles of white Burgundy—because it offers exceptional class at a price that’s rare for a wine of its quality.

A key to this wine’s concentration is its 30-year-old vines, rooted deep in the limestone-rich terroir of Pouilly-Vinzelles. Wedged between a millennium-old fortified castle and a 13th-century château, Vinzelles is a sliver of a village that Latour has been exploring since the days of Prohibition.

Most négociants are too busy rushing past Vinzelles to explore its 122 acres of southeast-facing Chardonnay vines—which have now been approved to receive their first Premier Cru designations, and are just hitting the market. Louis Latour therefore has prime access to the best fruit these vines have to offer. The house has been making wine from this special site for over 80 years, and 2022 is a terrific vintage for getting acquainted with this special corner of the Mâconnais.

Leave it to Louis Latour winemaker Jean-Charles Thomas to nail it. The same care he gave to the house’s Grand Cru holdings in Corton-Charlemagne and Chevalier-Montrachet is on full display here: a beautifully balanced Chardonnay that mirrors many pricier bottles in every way.