Gamay de Bouze

Identity

Gamay de Bouze is a teinturier: its flesh is coloured, not only its skin.

It is the exception to the rule that governs all winemaking. The juice of almost every black grape is colourless, and a red wine's colour comes from maceration with the skins. A teinturier bypasses that: its juice runs red straight from the press.

Pl@ntGrape puts a figure on the gap — its anthocyanin content is about twice that of Gamay Noir.

A mutation, and an address

It arose from a mutation of Gamay Noir, observed at the Burgundian village of Bouze-lès-Beaune, in the Côte-d'Or, whose name it carries.

This corpus has already published several mutations — the three Grenaches, the three Terrets, Clairette Rose. All were mutations of skin colour. This one goes further: it reaches the flesh, which changes not the grape's appearance but what can be done with the juice.

And it had offspring: Gamay de Chaudenay is a mutation of Gamay de Bouze, observed in 1832. Three steps from Gamay Noir, each more deeply coloured than the last.

In the vineyard

Early bud burst, early ripeness — like the Gamay it came from. Pl@ntGrape judges its "behaviour towards diseases and pests identical to that of Gamay Noir".

That is a mutation's signature: the plant is the same, only the fruit has changed.

In the glass

Deeply coloured wines but, the source specifies, less fruity than Gamay Noir. That is the teinturier's trade: colour gained, part of the aroma lost.

Its use is therefore utilitarian. A teinturier is not made on its own, it is dosed — a few per cent in a blend to lift a colour the other varieties do not give.

This entry's single descriptor, cherry, is a reading of the Gamay register, not a quotation.

Where it is named

In Beaujolais and Beaujolais-Villages, an accessory variety for reds and rosés.

They are the only two published appellations in this corpus to name it, which is consistent: a supporting teinturier belongs only in a Gamay vineyard.

What it gets confused with

Gamay de Chaudenay, its own mutation, more deeply coloured again. And Gamay Fréaux, a third teinturier of the family the source cites as more coloured than either — but which has no entry in this corpus, since no published appellation names it.

Gamay Noir itself is no teinturier: its juice is colourless like that of other black grapes.