Just back from one and a half days in the Côtes, and maybe this is already a good time to discuss the weather.
The landscape this week was quite magical – in fact my photos don’t do it justice; freezing mist but still with about 400m of visibility, sometimes more as glimpses of the hillsides made appearances.
The temperature was about -5°C causing the moisture in the air to crystallize onto all available surfaces; the vineyards looked like there had been snow. As for those temperatures – about time too! For weeks after the 2011 harvest the Côtes had warm temperatures and dry, sunny weather, in fact 2011 was one of the driest on record, despite intermittent rain through the summer. This was perfect for finishing the tasks like ploughing, and for those who do, pushing the soil up against the vines to give a small extra advantage against cold temperatures – temperature that we’ve yet to see.
A few growers I chatted with had been rather concerned because the temperatures had rarely been ‘minus’ so the vines weren’t completely dormant; many seemed to have retained their sap and even a few (mainly planted against walls) were showing the first signs of buds – it could have been a catastrophe if the Côtes were suddenly plunged to -20°C. This week’s weather seems like a good nudge to the vines to sleep a little, hopefully it’s just enough to ward off the worries.
I do wonder though; despite this general lack of ‘full’ dormancy, many were out in the vines, pruning and burning the waste – could it be a problem? I guess I’ll have to ask somebody who knows all about it – who better than Jeremy Seysses!!
Your summary captures the general anxiety pretty accurately. I would add a bit of context, namely that everyone got a real reminder of what a sudden drop in temperature can result in with the drop that happened in December 2009, which bears a large responsibility in the poor yields of 2010 and the many replanting one can see as one drives down the RN 74/D974. For me there is no shaking off that memory and I think of it every time I look at the thermometer and look at the weather forecast, much like every precocious vintage has me wondering if we risk getting another 2003 all over.
But going back to the question of the possible impact of pruning before any serious prolonged cold has hit. I am personally not too concerned about it. Most wine regions don’t get as cold as Burgundy over the winter and while the storage of the sap deeper in the vine is a good thing for that vine’s longevity, it is by no means fatal. As you can imagine, much of the US and most southern EU countries, etc. Don’t drop to -10°C terribly often. That we are attached to it is no doubt very much a reflection that in a decade in which we have seen all sorts of weather extremes and are concerned about climate change. There is something deeply reassuring about having a winter that looks like winter and a summer that feels like summer. I am certain that you can appreciate the psychological dimension of this. I do not think that this will necessarily have any real impact on the vintage, provided that we get a normal Spring or don’t get a 20°C drop in temperature overnight.
The wines of Le Moine seem to have polarised opinion – at least the wines of their first few vintages. Yet I’ve heard many recent reports of their transparency that are at odds with early pronouncements of ‘spoofulated’ wines. I have hardly visited for one simple reason; the wines seem rather expensive. But I can’t just rely on ‘hearsay’ can I? Hence, biting the occasional bullet…
On Saturday we started with a Mischief and Mayhem 2009 Puligny 1er les Pucelles and finished with their 2009 Puligny 1er Les Caillerets. It’s not long since I tasted these wines, and frankly I have nothing more to add to these notes, except that the Pucelles was more open. Sandwiched in-between was this wine from Le Moine:
2008 Lucien Le Moine, Meursault 1er Les Perrières
The bottle, I’m afraid to say, seems the glass equivalent of a red sports car; heavy, and with a punt into which you could lose your arm. Clearly the nose ushers in the presence of quite a bit of oak, a little transient gunflint/struck match too, yet this is far from jarring wood, indeed it is very well polished. In the mouth I have a faint hint of surprise; despite a perfectly smooth texture, this is a wine that’s clearly cut from the chalk of Perrières; mineral with some 08 tension and undoubted density and intensity. There are a few other MPs that I might might prefer to drink, all of them lower priced, but this is a very fine wine – no discussion. I have the impression of pear fruit on the palate yet without a hint of obvious sweetness. Very good line into the considerable finish. Clearly I have listened to too much hearsay, because this is super wine. Rebuy – Yes
Day 1 was pretty awful – less than 20m visibility – when you can’t tell up from down; that makes me nauseous, so I gave up. Saturday and Sunday, however, were picture perfect – if a tad cold. There was even some wine, but more of that tomorrow I think…
I liked this irreverent series of Oz Clarke and James May, but actually missed the episode where they visited Burgundy. Well here it is, and good fun too!
You may remember that I was mildly surprised by how good (or at least not bad) the quality of the Camus wines were: Well as the 2010 En-Primeurs are being rolled out, you might find you can buy this Chambertin for less than some ‘worthy’ producer’s villages Vosne, Chambolle or Gevrey – frankly ridiculous – assuming this Chambertin is any good of-course.
It turns out (in absolute terms) to be a very good wine indeed! It would clearly lag behind some other Chambertin, but this wine is indeed redolent of that vineyard, and the latest vintage is yours for only Euros 47 ex cellar. Remind me again of the cost of the Mugnier, Cathiard, Rousseau, Grivot (et al) 2010 villages…
1998 Camus, Chambertin
An auction purchase, but the bottles look in perfect condition – twirling capsules too – though I expected wax. Medium-plus colour with just a little amber at the rim. The nose has plenty of depth, understated leafy forest floor and a faint creamy edge to the muscled, dark-red fruit. With time the nose fills out with a hint of mushroom and an even clearer dark-red berry fruit. In the mouth this is full, reasonably intense and with a large-scaled flavour profile in the mid-palate. The length is understated but for all that, very impressive. The tannin is relatively faint but quite fine and still enveloping, perhaps adding to a little bitter-chocolate impression to the fruit in the mid-palate. And as a direct counterpoint? The Eugénie VR Brûlées is smoother, but has less scale and flavour dimension, it may be more elegant, but it seems there’s only so much you can extract from that terroir – despite charging almost 3x the price for it! Rebuy – Yes
Fair to say I’m not unhappy to have 5 more of these in the cellar; I expect they will keep improving for at least another 5-10 years…
Olivier Lamy’s high density planting in St.Aubin is for me, one of the iconic wines of Burgundy – despite vines that were planted only about 12 years ago – as such the wine can only get better! Here is a nice video showing them using their ‘Swiss plough’; the slope is too steep for a horse, downhill anyway.
To go with the earlier pictures, here is a video also gives you an hint of the difficulty you may have if you visit Olivier – he speaks the fastest French I ever encountered – I think he’s running at only 70% of usual speed for the video
Putting aside the fact that this wine costs approaching the double of what yesterday’s Jean Tardy set me back, what price can you put on contentment, or rather lack of contentment? Here is a wine that leaves you contented…
2007 d’Eugénie, Vosne-Romanée 1er Aux Brûlées
Medium, medium-plus colour. The nose is deep and padded with a hint of musk, fine spice and a creamy crust to the dark fruit aromas. Soft entry, but it’s a little glycerol cushioning that provides the softness, not a lack of structure or flabby fruit; here is a beautifully delineated wine – for a 2007 – clarity of flavour and clean-lines from the understated cool acidity, and even a good base of minerality. There’s a late arriving bitter twist to the serious fruit and finally just a little fine tannic texture. It would be easy to knock ‘Château Eugénie’, and this is certainly very, very polished wine but here is also a wine of class and distinction – the combination of those two words is a rarity in 2007 – not the absolute energy of a 2008 or 2010, but there’s something a little zen-like here. Rebuy – Yes
Slowly working myself into the new year – this is not such a bad start, but methinks, hardly a wine to search for – that said, Tardy remains attractively priced, or used to be anyway! Tomorrow I’ll go for another 07 Vosne 1er, but one that takes itself far more seriously – let’s see if it is warranted.
2007 Jean Tardy, Vosne-Romanée 1er Les Chaumes
Medium colour. The nose has some herbal elements above an understated but quite complex mix of fruit; cherry, strawberry and eventually a long redcurrant note. There is a hint of spice too, though I’m not sure if it’s from the soil or the barrel. I find a herbal element on the palate too – not quite green, but hinting at green. The texture is reasonably smooth, and seems to have an element of weight – tannin is there as a faint rasp on the end of your tongue. Decent length in a red register. I expect this had a bit better balance 18 months ago; today it’s far from seemless, the acidity just seems to be approaching ‘sharp’ if not quite there yet, though sweet and sour with emphasis on the sour could certainly be used. Day three: (only stoppered and left at about 17°C) and this wine is suddenly delicious; all herbal references have faded to relative insignificance and the fruit has a beguiling, understated sweetness – how did that happen? I don’t know, but I’d buy it again now! Rebuy – Yes
My pre-xmas cold returned with a vengance for Christmas, but slowly the coughing and spluttering is subsiding – I’ll probably be on great form when I return home!
I suppose that if I can’t drink, I can certainly read: I don’t seem to be able to ‘pdf’ this so I guess the link may not be extant for long, however, this section (of a very big book) looks quite interesting.
