(Wine -Searcher) - White Burgundy may take a secondary role to red Burgundy when it comes to price tags, but it is far and away the global leader when it comes to Chardonnay.

White wines only fill six places (3rd, 5th, 11th, 19th, 21st, 25th) in the top 25 most expensive Burgundies, but they account for 23 of the 25 most expensive Chardonnays – or all 25 if you exclude Blanc de Blancs Champagne.

All 10 wines highlighted below are from the Côtes de Beaune, the section of the Côte d'Or most associated with white wine, containing villages such as Puligny, Chassagne and Meursault. Not all of them are grand cru wines. Two are premier cru level, and one from a named non-premier cru lieu-dit. But as you would expect, all of this latter trio are from blue-chip estates.

Only two grand cru vineyards feature; five wines are from Le Montrachet and two from Corton-Charlemagne. This all seems to fit with the Burgundy drinker's dictum that, if in doubt, one should follow the producer at least as much as the wine's place in the appellation hierarchy.