Tasting Cult Wines with Yann Durieux

Is the hype justified? I met the man to find out.

He’s often described as “a cult winemaker”, “an icon in Burgundy” and even “a legend”. But the chatter about Yann Durieux in natural wine circles can be less positive. Whinging about stratospheric prices and relentless hype is common. Some say the wines just don’t deliver on their promise.

I’ve had hits and misses myself: Les Ponts that felt thin and sour on release, cooler vintages of Love and Pif (Durieux’s ‘entry level’ Aligoté) that tasted like battery acid. But the top wines can be breathtaking, and a mature bottle of Les Ponts 2014 recently blew my mind.

Durieux has quite the pedigree. He spent a decade working at Domaine Prieuré Roch before creating his own estate Recrue des Sens (roughly translated, “renewal of the senses”) in 2010. Starting out with two and a half hectares of his family’s vineyards in Hauts-Côtes de Nuits, his holdings now amount to 16 hectares, plus a further seven that he recently took over from his father. They include parcels in sought-after locations such as Gevrey-Chambertin and Nuits-Saint-Georges. The original plot is close to Domaine de la Romanée-Conti.

Although he’s often cast as a radical, a better word might be uncompromising. You’ll rarely see Durieux at wine fairs as he prefers to focus on the vineyards. Cellar work is stripped down - whole-bunch, long macerations, no filtration or fining, zero added sulphites. The wines are cellared for several years after bottling and before release.

Durieux has little patience with the appellation authorities and chooses to declassify everything as Vin de France. The cryptic initials on the labels are easy enough for Burgundy lovers to decode: GC = Gevrey-Chambertin, PV = Pernand-Vergelesses and so on.

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I first met Durieux in 2019, amidst the chaos of La Dive Bouteille¹. Resplendent with dreads down to his knees, he was completely surrounded by fans. I elbowed my way in for a 15-second audience and a few warm dribbles of wine. It didn’t really deepen my understanding of him or his oeuvre.

That had to wait until this year. The famously reclusive Durieux put in a surprise appearance at ViNoSo, a major natural wine fair organised by Bruno Levi Della Vida in Amsterdam. I set my alarm and showed up bright and early. Durieux was just opening the bottles.