my favorite burgundies by clive coates

My Favorite Burgundies

Contents

List of Maps / vii

Preface / ix

Part One • Vineyard PrOfiles

Puligny-Montrachet, Les Folatières, 2006 / 3

Chassagne-Montrachet, Les Caillerets, 2007 / 8

Meursault, Les Genevrières, 2008 / 12

Volnay, Les Santenots, 2005 / 17

Nuits-Saint-Georges, Les Saint-Georges, 2005 and 2006 / 20

Vosne-Romanée, Les Premiers Crus / 25

Romanée-Saint-Vivant / 37

Richebourg / 41

Echézeaux and Grands-Echézeaux / 46

Clos de Vougeot, 2005 / 53

Chambolle-Musigny, Les Amoureuses, 2005 / 59

Bonnes-Mares / 63

Gevrey-Chambertin, Clos-Saint-Jacques, 2005, 2002, and 1999 / 70

Part twO • dOmaine PrOfiles

Hospices de Beaune / 77

Domaine Marquis d’Angerville / 81

Domaine Denis Bachelet / 87

Domaine Bonneau du Martray / 91

Domaine Sylvain Cathiard / 98

Domaine Bruno Clair / 101

Domaine Dujac / 106

Domaine Fourrier / 111

Domaine Jean-Noël Gagnard / 114

Domaine Grivot / 117

Domaine Anne Gros / 123

Domaine Michel Gros / 127

Domaine des Comtes Lafon / 132

Domaine Lamarche / 138

Domaine Clos des Lambrays / 142

Demaine Leroy / 147

Vicomte de Liger-Belair / 154

Domaine Ponsot / 159

Domaine de la Pousse d’Or / 165

Domaine Ramonet / 174

Domaine de la Romanée-Conti / 180

Domaine Joseph Roty / 188

Domaine Guy Roulot / 191

Domaine Georges Roumier / 196

Domaine Armand Rousseau / 203

Clos de Tart / 209

Domaine Comte Georges de Vogüé / 215

Part three • Vintage assessments

When To Drink Your Burgundy / 222

abOut the assessments / 223

Chablis / 225

Chablis Grands Crus / 225

Chablis Grands Crus, 2010 / 228



the three-year-On tastings / 244

Savigny-Lès-Beaune, Premier Cru, 2009 / 244

2009 Burgundy / 248

Savigny-Lès-Beaune, Premier Cru, 2008 / 286

2008 Burgundy / 288

2007 Burgundy / 317

2006 Burgundy / 347

2005 Burgundy / 376

the ten-year-On tastings / 402

2002 Burgundy / 402

2001 Burgundy / 420

2000 Burgundy / 432

1999 Burgundy / 443

1998 Burgundy / 462

Other tastings / 473

1995 Burgundy / 473

1990 Burgundy / 479

Part fOur • ObserVatiOns

Premature OxidatiOn Of white burgundy / 491

biOdynamism / 494

sO yOu think tOday’s burgundies are

brilliant? / 496

what are winemakers dOing abOut glObal

warming? / 497

vii

MAPs

1. Burgundy / 2

2. Puligny-Montrachet, Les Folatières / 4

3. Chassagne-Montrachet, Les Caillerets / 9

4. Meursault, Les Genevrières / 13

5. Volnay, Les Santenots / 17

6. Nuits-Saint-Georges, Les Saint-Georges / 21

7. Vosne-Romanée, Les Premiers Crus / 26

8. Vosne-Romanée, Romanée-Saint-Vivant / 38

9. Vosne-Romanée, Richebourg / 42

10. Flagey-Echézeaux, Grands-Echézeaux / 47

11. Vougeot, Clos de Vougeot / 54

12. Chambolle-Musigny, Les Amoureuses / 60

13. Chambolle-Musigny, Bonnes-Mares / 64

14. Gevrey-Chambertin, Clos-Saint-Jacques / 71

15. Chablis, Grands Crus / 226

ix

I should begin by explaining what this book is, and what it is not. It is not a textbook about the wines of Burgundy. There are no chapters of the history and the geography of the region. Nor is there a village-by-village, vineyard-by-vineyard commentary, and a comprehensive listing of all the main growers and their wines. This I have done twice before: in Côte d’Or, pub-lished in 1998, and in The Wines of Burgundy, which appeared ten years later. Moreover, since 2008, my friend Jasper Morris has brought out his Inside Burgundy. This is a path well tilled.

My Favorite Burgundies should be regarded as a companion piece to The Wines of Burgundy. The latter is still valid. There have not been many major changes since The Wines of Bur-gundy appreared in 2008. The villages and the vineyards remain the same. So, very largely, do the domaines. The main changes are that we have five more vintages, and everyone is five years older. A handful of exploitations have evolved— the main ones being Lafon, Liger-Belair, Roulot, and Rousseau. These have been noted in the profiles which follow.

I am in the very lucky position of being able to take part in regular, extensive tastings of the major wines of Burgundy in bottle. What My Favorite Burgundies is, is an account of the oppor-tunities which have come my way since The

Wines of Burgundy went to press and my appre-ciation of the wines offered. I have split these occasions into three parts: Vineyard Profiles, in roughly south to north order; Domaine Profiles, in, apart from the first piece on the Hospices de Beaune, alphabetical order; and Vintage Assess-ments, in reverse chronological order.

While the list of wines offered is extensive, it does not pretend to be exclusively comprehen-sive. Production in fragmented Burgundy is meagre and stocks retained at the domaine tiny, normally just a few bottles kept back for birth-days and anniversaries. If you were the pro-prietor of an 80-hectare growth in the Médoc, you could well put aside five hundred bottles for future reference. And collectors would not find it impossible to acquire more than six or twelve bottles of any wine they desire. But with Burgundy it is different. If the wine that you seek a note on is not here, I can only apologize. There are limits to how greedy you can get. I have found my friends in Burgundy extremely generous, only equalled by the liberality of my friends with extensive cellars elsewhere. But the grower may simply not have the wine, or may be disinclined to offer it for tasting. Or, when the wines have come from stocks in the United States and elsewhere, the wine may not have been cellared in the first place.

PrefACe

x PrefAce

You may also wonder why a certain domaine or vineyard or vintage has been included in this book while others are absent. Here again it is also a question of opportunity. In the case of the vineyards and domaines, I have organised many myself and the rest have been tastings with groups of friends in Guilford, Connecti-cut, and other venues, mainly in the United States. I have included nearly all the estates to which I awarded the top three-star rating in The Wines of Burgundy. I have included many of the top vineyards but not, for instance, any grand cru Chambertins. The Guilford group went through the Gevrey card in the mid-2000s, and you will find these notes in The Wines of Burgundy. These occasions seemed to be too recent to repeat, so we put these aside in favour of other tastings. As far as the vintages are concerned, what appears in this book is, in the main, the five vintages that we tasted at three years on (2005– 2009) and the five at ten years on (1998– 2002). This follows on from earlier vintages reported on in The Wines of Burgundy.

Marking. You will notice that some wines are marked and some not. The reason for this is that I find it simple enough, where only one vintage is on the table, to place the wines in a rigid hierarchy. Yes. Wine A deserves 17.5; Wine B, alongside it, earns 18.0. When it comes to a mixture of vintages, I personally find this sort of marking more difficult. Vintages vary in quality, and I often find myself noting as more important, for instance, that Wine A, from a celebrated year, is marginally disappointing, while Wine B is an unexpected success com-pared with what one might expect. The thing, of course, is to read the words.

The University of California Press, being the publishers they are, send out commis-sioned and submitted books to outsiders for a peer review. I don’t know who my two peers are (though I have a suspicion of who one is). But they came up with a number of suggestions about how my manuscript could be improved;

they also pointed out a couple of mistakes. I have taken their comments on board, and the book is better as a result. My thanks to them.

I would like to thank the following, without whom these opportunities I have had to taste fine Burgundy would not have occurred, and without whose friendship, the world would be an unhappier place:

Firstly, in Burgundy: Becky Wasserman and Russell Hone, and all my friends the growers, particularly those whose domaines are profiled in this book, and those others who submitted samples for our tastings.

In Britain and Beaune: Roy Richards, Jas-per Morris, Toby Morrhall, Hew Blair, Lindsay Hamilton, Julie Petitjean, Zubair Mohammed, Christopher Moestue, and Neil Beckett.

In Connecticut: Bob Feinn, Gregg Cook, George and Jeri Sape, Jack and Thelma Hewitt, Alvin and Linda Wakayama, Jim and Deb-bie Cianciolo, Bruce and Pam Simonds, Keith and Judy Edwards, Doug Barzeley, and Roger Forbes.

Elsewhere in the United States: Tony and Judi Dietrich, Arlette and Bob Cataldo, Kevin and Mary-Virginia Hill, Joel and Joan Knox, Jim Kelley, Clay Cockerell, Joe Saglimbeni, Harold Wood, Tom Black, Marshall Katz, Jim and Elaine Israel, Don Scott, Bob Conrad, Jim Finkel, and David Hamburger.

A number of the pieces in this book have appeared in a prior form in Decanter Maga-zine, The World of Fine Wine, and the late and lamented Quarterly Review of Wine. I thank the editors of these magazines for their permission to use what I had written for them as the basis for the pieces which follow.

And finally, of course, I need to thank all the team at the University of California Press: Rich Nybakken, Leslie Larson, and Francisco Reink-ing; and Amy Smith Bell, Bea Hartman, Tanya Grove, and David Peattie of BookMatters; fin-ishing up with (and not least) Caterina Polland, who sends out the royalty cheques.

PArt one

vineyard Profiles

MaP 1 Burgundy

Côte deNuits

Côte deBeaune

To Dijon

To Lyon

Marsannay

Fixin

Brochon

Gevrey-Chambertin

Morey-Saint-Denis

Chambolle-Musigny

Vougeot

Flagey-Echézeaux

Vosne-Romanée

Nuits-Saint-Georges

Prémeaux

Chaux

Comblanchien

Corgoloin

Magny-les-Villers

Beaune

Chagny

Ladoix

Pernand-Vergelesses

Aloxe-CortonSavigny-lès-

Beaune

Chorey-lès-Beaune

Pommard

VolnayMonthelie

Auxey-Duresses

Saint-Romain

Meursault

Puligny-Montrachet

Saint-Aubin

Chassagne-Montrachet

Santenay

Remigny

Dezize-lès-Maranges

Sampigny-lès-Maranges

Cheilly-lès-Maranges

Auxerre

Yonne

Dijon

Lyon

Mâconnais

Saône-et-Loire

Mâcon

Chalon-sur-Saône

Côte deNuitsCôte de

Beaune

CôteChalonnaise

CôteMâconnais

Chablis

(detailed inmap below)

(detailed inmap below)

To Paris

4 kilometers0

0 2 miles

N

BURGUNDY

Map 1

3

les, Or ez fOlatières, is Puligny’s larg-est first growth, at 17.65 hectares. It lies on the same altitude as Les Caillerets, Chevalier-Montrachet, and Le Montrachet itself, but to the north, between 250 and 300 metres above sea level. It includes the lieux-dits of En La Richarde, a recent addition, Peux Bois, and Au Chaniot— all of which are at the southern end.

While many would argue that Caillerets is possibly the best of the Puligny premiers crus, Folatières is certainly among the very best. Those further upslope— Le Garenne, La Truffière, Les Champs Gain, and others— are lighter and less fine, and in lesser years can be a bit thin. Clavoillon, below, produces a more four-square wine. Only Clos de la Garenne, next to Folatières, Perrières, Combettes, and Champ Canet, further north towards Meursault, plus Pucelles, which marches with Bienvenues-Bâtard-Montrachet, can match the elegance of Folatières, and only in Clos de la Garenne (owned by the Duc de Magenta and exclusive to Maison Jadot) will you find a wine with the same depth of character.

As you would expect in Burgundy, though essentially limestone, the geology is complex. The lower and eastern part of the Folatières climat is made up of a compact, hard, erosion-resistant lower Bathonian rock, found and quar-ried a couple of kilometres away in Chassagne-Montrachet. The surface soil is rich in stones and rather thin. The uppermost part consists of compact limestones and dolomites equiva-lent to the Comblanchien rocks of the Côte de Nuits, and also found in the rocky outcrop between Genevrières and Narvaux in Meur-sault. The soils are once again thin and rich in stones. Between the two lies a thin strip of marl abundant in large mussel-like fossils. Erosion is more commonplace here, so rendering the sha-lier soils found here more concave. Downslope there is a distinct fault, below which the lime-stone resembles that of the hill of Corton. You can see the fault in the upper part of Le Mon-trachet. (My thanks to Francoise Vannier-Petit, local geologist, for this information.)

But, while this geology is instructive, what effect does this have on the wine? Eric Rémy,

Puligny-Montrachet, les Folatières, 2006

MAP 2 Puligny-Montrachet, Les Folatières

11

3

3

2

6

5

5

55

5

4

44

4

4

4

4

3

Ez Folatières

Peux Bois

En la Richarde Au Chaniot

Domaine des Lambrays

Bernard et Thierry GlantenayChâteaude Puligny-Montrachet

Domaine d’AuvenayVincent Girardin

Thierry Glantenay

Vincent Girardin

Sylvain Bzikot

Vincent Bouzereau

Sébastien Magnien

Bachelet-Monnot

Jean Pascal et Fils

Jean Pascal et Fils

Alain Chavy

Charles Allexant et Fils

Jean-LouisChavy

Jean-LouisChavy Jean-LouisChavy

Jean-LouisChavy

Jean-Louis Chavy

Alain Chavy

Jean Pascal et Fils

Hubert Chavy-ChouetPhilippe Chavy

Phili

ppe

Cha

vy

Jean Pascal et Fils

Maroslavac-LégerGacon-

Moingeon

Domaine Leflaive

Michel Caillot

Xavier Monnot

Paul Pernot et Fils

PaulPernotet FilsChanson Père et Fils

Paul Pernotet Fils

Bernard-Bonin

DomaineOpale

Louis Jadot

Domaine d’Auvenay

Louis Jadot

Benoît EnteEtienne Sauzet

Vincent Bouzereau

Thevenot-Machal

Mancerond’Esdouhard

René Monnier

Jean Chartron

Bachelet-Monnot

Bernard & Emmanuel Courreaux, Therese Roussel

Vincent Bouzereau

Jean-Louis Chavy

Alain Chavy

Chanson Père et Fils

1

2

3

4

5

6

(detailed in map below)Les Folatières

To Beaune

To Chalon-sur-Saône

Saint-Aubin

Puligny-Montrachet

Chassagne-Montrachet

Meursault

N

100 meters0

0 100 yards

PULIGNY-MONTRACHET,Les Folatières

PulIgNy-MONtrAchet, leS fOlAtIèreS, 2006 5

a meaty wine. Long and satisfying. Very good indeed.

Bernard-Bonin From 2014 18.5

16 ares. 18 months. 30 percent new oak.

Clean, crisp, racy, high-class nose. Subtle and flowery. Medium-full body. Ripe, complex, lovely fruit. Very well-balanced. Lots of depth and distinction. Very fine. Just about ready.

Vincent bouzereau now to 2018 15.0


Delicate nose. There doesn’t seem to be a lot of depth here. On the palate medium to medium-full body. Clean and enjoyable. But not really the concentration and dimension of a top pre-mier cru. Balanced but a bit slight. Good at best.

sylvain bzikot From 2014 17.0

40 ares. 15 to 18 months. 40 percent new oak.

Ripe nose, a touch exotic. Fullish, open, bal-anced, and just about à point. Good grip. Plump. Quite rich. An attractive wine which is long on the palate and just about ready. Very good indeed.

michel Caillot now to 2017 15.5

17 ares. 12 months in cask, followed by 12 months en

cuve. 100 percent 1-year-old casks.

Quite evolved and a little tropical on the nose. Full and rich, but does it lack a little grip? Bet-ter on the palate. Fullish, abundant, decent acidity. Not too exotic, but it could have done with a little more finesse. Balanced and quite concentrated nevertheless. Good plus.

Jean Chartron now to 2017 17.0

45 ares. 12 months in cask and then 3 in vat.

30 percent new oak.

Attractive, cool, and minerally on the nose, but a little lightweight. Medium to medium-full body. Good attack, ripe and racy with a touch of new oak. Lacks a little energy on the follow-through but by no means short. Very good indeed.

regisseur of the Domaine Leflaive, says that in the southern part of the climat there is a little more clay: hence powerful but elegant wines with good fruit; while the more stony northern section makes more mineral wines. Franck Grux of Olivier Leflaive Frères points out that upslope the surface soil is very thin. It can get very hot and dry; and the fruit can rapidly degenerate into super-ripeness, producing wine which is heavy and superficial on the follow-through: too primeur for comfort. I incline to the view that the best sector is that on the same latitudinal line as the Caillerets, rather than further upslope. Here are the most complete Folatières.

Those who have vines here, in rough south to north order, include Philippe Chavy, the Château de Puligny, Domaine des Lambrays, Jean Chartron, Réne Monnier, Paul Pernot (in part), Vincent Girardin, and Sylvain Bzikot. Folatières is a full wine, meaty, mineral, and with plenty of weight of fruit and good grip. It ages well. The best, in the best vintages, require seven or eight years to mature. I asked the growers in the early months of 2010 whether they would be interested in participat-ing in a comparative tasting, and I chose 2006, one of the best of the recent vintages, though perhaps one which is more vintage- than terroir-representative. They responded enthu-siastically, though some did not have a single bottle to spare for the tasting.

The tasting was held at Hotel/Restaurant Le Montrachet in Puligny itself. My thanks to André Berthier, chef sommelier, and his col-leagues for setting up the tasting.

tasting notes

bachelet-monnot From 2014 17.0

43 ares. Bottled after 18 months. 30 percent new oak.

Slightly heavy nose, with a touch of sulphur and at the same time some evolution. Better on the palate. Much cleaner. Fullish body. Very good grip. Plenty of depth. Properly dry. Quite

6 VINeyArd PrOfIleS

Not the greatest of class but good energy. Good plus.

benoit ente now to 2018 17.0


Classy if not very concentrated on the nose. Fullish, clean, racy, and energetic on the palate. Finishes better than it starts. No lack of depth or finesse. Very good indeed.

Vincent girardin now to 2020 19.0

1.40 ha. 18 months. 20 percent new oak.

Very lovely nose. Lots of class. Subtle and com-plex. Balanced and definitive. Medium-full body. Ripe, multidimensional, especially at the end. Very lovely. Very fine plus.

thierry glantenay now to 2020 19.5


Classy nose. Still closed. Fullish body. Bal-anced, and full of fruit. This is really very fine indeed. Multidimensional.

louis Jadot now to 2019 18.5


Delicate nose. A little more marked by the oak than most. Medium-full body. Ripe, clean, and well-balanced. Gently oaky on the palate but long and classy. Very fine.

domaine des lambrays From 2014 19.5


Full, concentrated, very well-balanced nose. This is profound and youthful. Full-bodied. Ripe, rich, and vigorous. Lots of wine here. Lots of depth and lots of class. Very lovely fin-ish. Needs time. Very fine indeed.

maison louis latour now to 2017 15.0

usually buy the equivalent of 10 pièces. 12 months.

50 percent new oak.

Not a great deal on the nose. Medium-full body. Somewhat four-square. Not a lot of either class nor dimension, but decent grip and length. Good.

Chàteau de Puligny From 2014 17.5

52 ares. 12 months plus 3 months en cuve. 15 percent

600 litre new oak casks.

Firm, quite closed nose. But good depth and grip underneath. Lots of class too. Full body, backward, meaty, and profound. Very good grip. It is just a little four-square at present, but it needs time. Fine.

alain Chavy From 2014 17.5

1.35 ares. 15 to 16 months. 25 percent new oak.

A slight touch of sulphur on the nose. Better on the palate. Youthful. Medium-full body. Lots of energy and plenty of depth. Lovely balanced, classy fruit, and very good grip. Fine.

hubert Chavy now to 2018 18.0


From magnum. Lovely rich, ripe nose. A touch more exotic than most. Lovely fruit. Medium-full body. Subtle, balanced, vigorous, and very complex at the end. Very long and classy indeed. Fine plus.

Jean-louis Chavy now to 2018 18.5


Lovely subtle nose. Delicate, complex, classy fruit. Not a blockbuster. Indeed quite under-stated. Very harmonious, long, and complex. Very fine.

Philippe Chavy From 2014 19.0


The nose is quite hidden. Fullish and a bit four-square on the palate. But a lot of depth and vigour. Still very young. Fullish, classy, very good grip. Got better and better in the glass. Very fine plus.

maison Joseph drouhin now to 2017 15.5

usual purchase not disclosed. 11 months. 30 percent

new oak.

Just a touch of sulphur on the nose. Ripe and rich and quite exotic on the palate. Fullish body.

PulIgNy-MONtrAchet, leS fOlAtIèreS, 2006 7

maison remoissenet Père et fils From 2014 18.0

usually buy the equivalent of 5 pièces. 16 months.

40 percent new oak.

Ripe, racy, and classy on the nose. Profound and stylish. Lots of dimension. Full-bodied. Youthful. Very good depth. A big wine with lots of energy. Needs time. Fine plus.

etienne sauzet now to 2017 17.0

27 ares. Plus the equivalent of 9 pièces bought as

négociant. 18 months. 25 percent new oak.

Lovely fruit on the nose. Ripe, clean, and har-monious. Nicely racy. Medium-full body. Bal-anced. Good grip. It just seems to tail off a bit at the end. Very good indeed but not fine.

I took a consensus of the group’s preferences. The four most favoured wines were those of Vincent Girardin, Domaine Leflaive, Olivier Leflaive, and Remoissenet— the last two being merchant wines (but where such merchants were heavily involved in the local viticulture and were bought in as fruit). The Lambrays sample, plus one or two others, were late arriv-als and sampled seperately. Note that Chanson and Faiveley, who can today offer you Folatières, did not possess their parcels in 2006.

En primeur, Puligny-Montrachet, Les Fola-tières, 2006, was offered at 240 to 275 pounds sterling per six bottles, ex cellars, to custom-ers in Britain, $450 or so per sixpack in the United States. As well as the above, the fol-lowing also produce Folatières: the Domaine d’Auvenay in Saint-Romain, Jean-Michel Gaunoux and Château Genot-Boulanger, both in Meursault, and the Domaine Maroslavac-Léger in Puligny. The wine may also be car-ried by other merchants.

domaine leflaive From 2014 18.5

1.07 ha. 12 months in cask, then 6 to 8 months in

tank. 20 percent new oak.

From magnum. Good balanced fruit on the nose. Fullish body. Ripe. Good grip. Good depth. Lots of energy and a long way from being ready for drinking. Lots of dimension and concentration. Very fine.

maison Olivier leflaive frères now to 2018 18.5

usually buy the equivalent of 8 to 10 pièces. 15 to 18

months. 25 percent new oak.

From magnum. Subtle nose. There is more here than seems at first. Classy and very har-monious. Lovely fruit. Fullish body. Ripe and complex and multidimensional. Very lovely, long, lingering finish. Very fine.

rené monnier From 2014 19.5


From magnum. Complex, subtle nose. Still not fully evolved. But classy and promising. Beauti-fully balanced. Fullish body. Poised, energetic, and very high class. Very fine indeed.

Jean Pascal et fils now to 2018 18.0


Attractive peachy fruit on the nose. Good grip. Ample and very Puligny. Medium-full body. Succulent, pure, balanced, and classy. Lovely finish. Fine plus.

Pernot drink soon 13.5


Not a lot of depth or class on the nose. A bit of sulphur too. I feel this is one of those 2006s that was picked a little late. It is a little con-cocted. Others liked it more than I did. Three voted it as one of their favourites.

my favorite burgundies by clive coates

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