Meet the Winemaker Changing the Game in France’s Stodgiest Wine Region
Jessica Litaud is a rising star in Burgundy’s oft-overlooked Mâconnais subregion.
The wines of Burgundy are not for the faint of heart. Beyond the extortionate prices, scant availability, and cultish fandom, the region’s obscenely complex and infuriatingly pedantic appellation system can drive even the most seasoned wine drinker mad. Across nearly 30,000 hectares planted to vines, Burgundy’s five subregions (from north to south: Chablis, Côte de Nuits, Côte de Beaune, Côte Chalonnaise, and Mâconnais) are divided into a further 44 villages in which there are over 650 premier cru and 33 grand cru vineyards. Needless to say, not all burgundy is created equal. In the minds of many, Mâconnais—which lies at the far south of the region, just 60 kilometres north of Lyon—is the least quality oriented of the five subregions. However, the region, which is home to zero grand cru vineyards and produces chardonnays of notably fuller body and alcohol thanks to its southerly location, has undergone a change of face, and it now incubates some of the finest young winemakers in France’s stodgiest of wine regions.
Among those young winemakers in the Mâconnais, none stands quite so tall as Jessica Litaud, the Burgundy native whose eponymous domaine epitomizes the quality turn in Burgundy’s most overlooked subregion. Now based in Vergisson, a tiny commune that sits at the foot of one of Mâconnais’s many limestone cliffs, dramatic outcroppings that help concentrate the heat that produces the region’s “hotter” wines, she combines the experiences she inherited from her Burgundian ancestors with the knowledge she gained by working with the legendary Jean-François Ganevat in France’s Jura region. Making only white wine from chardonnay and aligoté, Litaud stands apart from the riff-raff by leaning into the inherent fruit qualities of Mâconnais fruit, avoiding altogether the propensity to overoak and overextract, techniques sometimes used by other less-nuanced winemakers to supposedly elevate the humble fruit of the subregion.
When asked how young winemakers such as herself can stand out in a wine region as historic and acclaimed as Burgundy, Litaud attributes her success to the time she spent in Jura. “Learning a few techniques from other wine regions that cultivate Chardonnay is beneficial,” she says of her chosen white grape, which is also among the two widely used in Jura. “Diversify by working with the terroir above all else. That is to say, adapt to nature, harvest earlier, and vinify without additives. Let the vintage speak for itself.” Jura, which has been a hotbed of experimentation both historically and in modern times, is particularly well known for its vast array of organic and biodynamic producers, and Litaud has transported many of those practices to her 2.1 hectares of vineyards, all of which have been certified organic since 2023 and are farmed biodynamically.
Litaud’s wines are well on their way to attaining the cult status that Ganevat’s have. Via technical moves such as gentle pressing and extended élevage in used oak barrels, Litaud renders distinctive wines that balance effusive fruit flavours with elegant secondary qualities. Even the 2023 aligoté, made with Burgundy’s other white grape—known for making high-acid mineral wines often drank as aperitifs—provides a depth of flavour that belies its humble components. The characteristic minerality is present at first, with ripping acid matched by lemon, lime, and underripe peach flavours, before giving way to pretty honeydew and white-flower notes that dance along the exceedingly long finish.
But it is with her many chardonnay cuvées from across Mâconnais, including a few prize premier cru sites, that Litaud displays the true breadth of her talents. One of the most famous names that appears on her labels is Pouilly-Fuissé, a village appellation that has long stood out in Mâconnais for its quality and is often compared to the more heralded wines of the Côte de Beaune subregion. One such cuvée’s name, La Simpléxité, is a portmanteau of simplicité and complexité, and is evocative of the subtle depths of the 2023 vintage. Flavours of candied orchard fruit and ripe stone fruit are counterbalanced by the pure mineral freshness of grapes grown on the region’s clay and limestone soils.
One typically Burgundian trait that Litaud’s wines have? They disappear quickly. Imported to Ontario by Lucas Labelle of Labelle Wines & Liquors, the many cuvées of the wunderkind of Mâconnais, while not quite so hard to track down as a bottle of DRC, have amassed a feverish fandom of their own. Luckily, a new shipment is set to arrive this spring—but if similar quality wines from Burgundy’s more heralded subregions, not to mention Jura, are any proof, they won’t last long.
Two Jessica Litaud Wines to try:
Pouilly-Fuissé La Simpléxité 2023
