Clotilde Davenne – 2015

Update 30.1.2020(28.2.2017)billn

Tasted in Préhy with Clotilde Davenne, 19 January, 2017.

Domaine Clotilde Davenne
3, rue de Chantemerle
89800 Préhy
Tel: +33 3 86 41 46 05
www.clotildedavenne.fr

Clotilde was quite succinct about the last two vintages:

2016 – there was almost no harvest!

2015 – was a normal harvest, but lower yields in the old vines!

The wines…

Much of the bottling was done in December 2016. Such a great range of wines – there were many more on the cusp of highlighting from here range – bravo!

2015 Saint Bris
Young vines – 19 years old.
Ooh. Deep, a little cushioned, and some sweetness, a pretty point of sauvignon. This is really inviting. Wide, fresh, bright, lucious, with beautiful acidity. A burst of finishing flavour with melting sweetness. Bravo. A great wine!
2015 Saint Bris Old Vines
More than 100 years old and not yet bottled.
Bigger, wider, even more complex, less direct sauvignon character – round and lovely. Lots of gas. A little more direct, melting flavour again, wide, complex, you could easily be drinking a Chablis 1er cru here in terms of the shape and mouth-watering flavour. More rigour for sure and needing a little more time.

2015 Aligoté
75 year-old vines, still vigorous with a good exposure.
A fresh, slightly golden impression to the nose. Good width, again a melting impression to the flavour, holding a great line with just a touch of salinity. A hint of flowers and a nice finishing line. A touch of finishing texture too. Tasty wine.

2015 Bourgogne Blanc
25 year-old vines in Prehy, delimited from Chablis
A softer nose, yet tighter. Anything but tight in the mouth – this is open, energetic, nicely complex and with a great line of flavour – you would say Chablis blind. Sweetly complex in the finish. Lovely.

2015 Beaujolais Blanc
From around St.Amour, the vines aged 35.
Hmm, bright and fresh with a little overt herb. Supple, fresh, direct hmm – this is completely delicious.

2015 Macon Blanc
A blend of different parcels
A fresh, more saline nose. Wide, mineral, citrus-infused flavour. Really lovely in the mouth – complex, faintly floral and absolutely delicious.

2015 Macon-Azé
Bio vines from Les Grands Bruyères
A more intense and direct nose – not directly a delicious impression, yet inviting all the same. A little more richness of flavour, depth of flavour too. More herbed, more muscled. Herbed in the finishing flavours too. But long and mouth-watering with just a touch of tannic texture.

2015 Bourgogne Blanc Boisé
A Macon village wine, in a mix of barrel ages for 12 months.
A more floral note, perhaps slowly releasing a little barrel too. Also in the mouth this is very floral, nicely textured and slowly in the mid-palate and finish there is a sweet, creamy oak too. A little too much oak for today, yet it is delicious in its style already.

2015 Petit Chablis
Young vines on Kimmerigian, two parcels assembled.
A little tighter, a slight softness, but a correct and faintly herbed nose. Wide, fresh, mouth-watering wine. A super line of flavour with excellent acidity. Bright with a little lime fruit.

2015 Chablis
Some bought grapes on the hillside of Courgis, 40 years old.
Deep, a little savoury but this nose is slowly opening with a riper core of fruit. This is lovely in the mouth, fresh melting flavour, no padding, just a chamferring of the edges, long and deliciously flavoured – lovely in the finish too, with a little hint of the floral.

2015 Chablis Vieilles Vignes
From vines older than 50 – the average is about 70 years old.
fresh, sweet, transparent complexity, a little more depth of riper fruit. Hmm – melting acidity – a beautiful line of flavour, indeed a really great line of flavour, long, long…excellent!
2015 Chablis 1er Montmains
35-year-old vines in Courgis, from the bottom of Montmains.
Ooh! – rounder, sweeter, a ripe fruit – almost quince. Despite the ripe fruit this is beautifully wide, and mouth-watering. Really long, simply delicious wine – bravo!

2015 Chablis 1er Vaucoupin
Here a little more rigour – a cooler, more mineral nose – very engaging. In the mouth too, stricter, but melting flavour, long and invigorating. Really a fine complexity here, less overtly gourmand vs the Montmains, but super wine that requires just a little more patience. Super!

2015 Chablis 1er Fourchaume
A little riper, yellower fruit, a growing vibrancy of aroma. Here the stance is a little more rigorous again, not quite austere, and that’s despite a ripe fruit core. Broad, mineral, a hint phenolic – and you know that I like that! Really you should be patient, but again a really super wine.

2015 Chablis Bougros
A large-scaled nose – some floral and some herb aspects, but a beautiful line of chiselled sweetness behind. Really a fresh wine, a wine of intensity and complexity, not a wine of richness – a racehorse. Fresh, complex and very long, really holding brilliantly well. I love!
2015 Chablis Blanchots
40-year-old vines.
A ‘blanket’ comes to mind, a wine that covers and cossets. A little more considered depth of aroma, less width. Really a palpable extra width of flavour, a richness of flavour without really an extra richness of texture. Then a panorama of finishing flavour. Really this is lovely cosseting wine – I usually love Blanchots and here is no exception.
2015 Chablis Les Clos
Like all wines at this domaine, never any wood.
Both height and aromatic depth, really much tighter in the width – but transparent clarity of fresh aroma, mineral-tinged with citrus. Hmm, this is extra mouth-watering, extra wide and with beautiful bright notes of complexity, just subtly saline. A beauty and a complex beauty at that – sublime wine – bravo!

As Clothilde told me last year: “My family origin is a partly from Champagne so I like bubbles and I’m happy to have some gas in some of my ‘still’ cuvées:”

Cremant de Bourgogne Blanc Zero dosage
Pretty, quince, fresh nose. Bright and fresh in the mouth. Wide, at the same time delicate and complex but also with a good intensity. Simply a very tasty wine!

Cremant de Bourgogne Rosé
100% pinot and also zero dosage. Both these have 18 months on lees.
A more open nose that’s wide and fresh if currently lacking a direct fruit comparison. A nice line of intensity in the mouth, just a touch more softness. And a very nice line of flavour, holding well in the finish. Today I might rather take the extra fresh clarity of the former wine.

Cremant de Bourgogne Rosé (Brut Extra)
A bright attack of aroma – touched with ted fruit also all pinot. More overt bubbles in the mouth, but not at all coarse. Fine red-fruited freshness in the mid-palate and even more-so in the finish. This is lovely.

Les Rouges:

2015 Mâcon Rouge
From Milly-Lamartine 100% gamay with some old oak elevage. 70 year-old vines
A nose with a nice volume, deep bass notes, and a little fresher above. A good width with a backing of well-controlled tannin. Floral top notes in the mid-palate and length. A young wine but very, very tasty.

2015 Bourgogne Rouge
From Côtes d’Auxerre
A bright fresh and really interesting, partly mineral nose – this is lovely. Supple, fresh, layered, delicious complexity with some violet flavours – easy – bravo!
2015 Irancy
With 10% cesar. From Paradis and Les Rez
Wide, interesting, some violets, a little less open than the last but a similar vernacular. Wide, muscled but not rich, supple, intense, a little accent of herb. A very fine, and rather young Irancy. Drink the bourgogne while you exercise some patience!

Agree? Disagree? Anything you'd like to add?

There is one response to “Clotilde Davenne – 2015”

  1. kmilani21st March 2017 at 12:51 amPermalinkReply

    Is this the first time you have endorsed Beaujolais Blanc?

    • billn21st March 2017 at 7:28 amPermalinkReply

      It is indeed – something of shock!
      A shame that the domaine is so far away from Beaujolais – eh? 🙂

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