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!
Chambertin
2008 Camus Chambertin
2007 Leroy Chambertin
2008 Giroud Camille Chambertin
2008 Roche de Bellene Chambertin
2008 Gambal Alex Chambertin
2001 Esmonin Frédéric Chambertin
Medium, medium-plus colour – certainly paler than the Bèze. The nose starts with coffee/caramel oak and sweetly browning sugar – slowly it develops a very pretty red berry note. In the mouth there’s good intensity that is driven by great acidity – the acidity also helps push a very good length. Quite linear and not overtly powerful. The nose gets better and better – it becomes a gorgeous and complex melange of candied and jellied red fruits. It doesn’t appear to be a ‘great’ Chambertin as today I miss a punch and complexity in the mid-palate, but it’s a very lovely wine and certainly has the balance to age very well.
2004 Giroud Camille Chambertin
Deep, initially dominated by oaky notes though they quickly fade leaving a very tight aromatic profile – needs time in the glass. In the mouth it is dense, silky and with plenty of well covered structure. Sneakily long with an edge of barrel flavour. A wine that begs a few years in bottle, but seems to have good potential. The funny thing is that the majority of Giroud 04’s that I’ve tasted don’t have much 04 taint – the ladybirds were there, I photo’d them, maybe it’s not them – but who’s complaining this wine’s lovely.
2006 Perrot-Minot Christophe Chambertin
No dark monster this – merely medium colour. The nose is different this time – good! – it’s mainly fruit that is focused yet still complex and very round – wow. Maybe there are some toasted barrel flavours, but this wine is wide, complex and concentrated. Frankly, everything that a Chambertin should be – super.