Bourgogne Aligoté

A generic appellation in Burgundy for wines made from the white Aligoté grape variety, covering barely 2% of the 28,000 ha planted throughout Burgundy. The wines are usually very crisp and racy in style, showing less flesh and ripeness than Charodnnay and are most often aged in steel tanks or less often used wooden barrels, so oak is of minimal influence. There are some very basic, sometimes rather tart, examples that are blended in French brasseries with cassis or kir to be seved as an aperitif, however there are some extremely good examples, the best of which seem to come from Pernand-Vergelesses in the Côte de Beaune, and Bouzeron, which has its own appellation for Aligoté.