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Less than an hour away from Chablis, Vézelay could provide wine-lovers with a new option to pair with oysters and smoked salmon this festive season. France's prestigious Burgundy wine region now has new Protected Designation of Origin (PDO) for its Vézelay wines, according them protected status throughout Europe.
Less than an hour away from Chablis, Vézelay could provide wine-lovers with a new option to pair with oysters and smoked salmon this festive season. France's prestigious Burgundy wine region now has new Protected Designation of Origin (PDO) for its Vézelay wines, according them protected status throughout Europe.
Pale in color, with a yellow tint that reaches out to the taste buds with its golden reflections. Vézelay wines owe this to the only grape variety found here: Chardonnay. This key grape of the famous Chablis designation, located not far away, is also grown in this other terroir, known only to connoisseurs. But the popularity of Vézelay wines is likely to soar in the coming months as this wine-producing area has just received the ultimate symbol of recognition. France's National Institute of Origin and Quality (INAO) has awarded it a PDO, or Protected Designation of Origin.
When it comes to the Yonne department of France's Bourgogne-Franche-Comté region, people usually think of Chablis when looking for a wine to match with a fish dish, or even a comté cheese or goat cheese. But in this particular area -- also home to Irancy wines, for lovers of robust reds -- another dry white with floral aromas is prepared by a score of winegrowers who have, for several decades, been working towards the revival of land fallen into oblivion after the phylloxera crisis at the end of the 19th century. Thus, Vézelay is considered a "new" wine-growing area, since its reorganization in the 1970s. The wines of Vézelay were grouped under the "Bourgogne Vézelay" designation from 1998. The specific identity of the wines of this area, which stretches between the hillsides of the villages of Vézelay, Asquins, Saint-Père and Tharoiseau, was then further recognized with the award of a French AOC (Appellation d'Origine Contrôlée) in 2017. Born from soils composed of clay and limestone, these wines are distinguished by their young nature and their vivacity of taste.
By obtaining the PDO, the work of the winegrowers of Vézelay, whose harvest amounted to 2,805 hectoliters in 2020, is protected from counterfeiting within the entire European Union. This distinctive sign of quality "designates a product in which all stages of production are carried out according to recognized expertise in the same geographical area, which gives the product its characteristics," recalls the INAO.
