What is the difference between bordeaux and burgundy?

Six varieties are permitted for red AOC Bordeaux: cabernet sauvignon, cabernet franc, merlot, cot, carmenère and petit verdot.

The cahier des charges of the AOC Bordeaux names those six as the main varieties for red wine and for rosé with the designation clairet. A bottle of Bordeaux is therefore often a composition of several varieties. Which proportion a château chooses depends on the soil and on the year. The same label can therefore be composed differently from year to year.

Red AOC Bourgogne has pinot noir as the main variety and white AOC Bourgogne chardonnay and pinot blanc.

The cahier des charges of the AOC Bourgogne also mentions secondary varieties: chardonnay, pinot blanc and pinot gris for red, and pinot gris for white. In the Yonne department, césar may also take part. A bottle of bourgogne therefore usually comes from a single variety. For red that is pinot noir, for white chardonnay.

Bordeaux has classifications that rank producers, whereas Burgundy places its ranking in the appellations themselves, per delimited piece of land.

The idea of classification goes back to 1855 in Bordeaux and revolves around châteaux. In Burgundy it works the other way round: the cahier des charges of the AOC Bourgogne includes additional geographical names such as Hautes Côtes de Beaune, Vézelay and Tonnerre, each with its own rules. The name on the label there refers to a place and not to a house.

The Bordeaux bottle has straight shoulders and the Burgundy bottle slopes away, but neither shape is laid down in European legislation.

Regulation (EU) 2019/33 protects in Annex VII four bottle types: the Flûte d’Alsace, the Bocksbeutel, the Clavelin of 0.62 litre and the Tokaj bottle. The Bordeaux and Burgundy bottles are not listed there and are therefore custom, not law. For the contents of the bottle the shape makes no difference.

In the European Union, still wine between 100 and 1,500 ml may only be prepacked in eight fixed sizes, including the standard 750 ml.

Those sizes are 100, 187, 250, 375, 500, 750, 1,000 and 1,500 ml. They are listed in the annex to Directive 2007/45/EC and apply to Bordeaux just as much as to Burgundy. The half bottle of 375 ml and the magnum of 1,500 ml occur with both. Outside that interval the series does not apply.