Dominique Gallois – 2016

4.2.2018billn

Tasted in Gevrey-Chambertin with Dominique Gallois, 31 January 2018.

Domaine Dominique Gallois
9 Rue Mal de Lattre de Tassigny
21220 Gevrey-Chambertin
Tel: +33 3 80 34 11 99
www.domaine-gallois.com

All the wines remain in barrel for the moment, Dominique planning probably April to start bottling.

In 2016 he had a lot of damage across his range of crus in bourgogne – and not just from the frost – ‘gibiers’ (wild animals) finished what the frost left in his 1er cru Goulots – so there is none. His Bourgogne normally delivers 7 barrels but, thanks to frost, there is just one. In the end Dominique describes the quantity as ​practically 50% of a regular vintage – even his Charmes-Chambertin was also only half a harvest. “2017 was happily a much easier vintage. 2015 and 2016 are really good, but the quantity of both is very lacking.

Interestingly, because Dominique has a lot of old vines, he told me that he is having some success regrafting vines that have ‘died’ – it only works in the first 1-2 years since the death of the old graft, but regrafting onto the old rootstock he has a success rate of almost 90% – so this is a much better (faster) solution than repicage i.e. replacing each single vine with a new planting.

The wines…

Just a fabulous range in this vintage – and today even more impressive in 2015 – there are many new names to choose in Gevrey, but some of the older ones also deliver impeccable wines!

2016 Bourgogne Rouge
​Open, perfumed, with plenty of aromatic density. Great fruit is the first impression then the wine slowly starts to melt its flavours over the palate. A supple, well textured, delicious bourgogne – but there’s not much!

2016 Gevrey-Chambertin
11 parcels worth of fruit
Deep, impressive – really a gorgeous nose. Some wood is here, but there is extra concentration, extra width, and a velvet tannin too. Sweetly, dark-red fruited. Wait a couple of years for the oak to fade, but this is very balanced despite its voluptuous charms. Long too. Florals and precision too – yes!

​2016 Gevrey-Chambertin 1er Petits Cazetiers
A more pinched nose, but deep and with lovely precision. Extra width, extra dimensions of flavour, a little mid-palate tannin, but velvet again with faint salinity. Super finish. What a great package!

2016 Gevrey-Chambertin 1er Combe aux Moines
About 0.5 hectares, planted in 1954. Never a high yielding plot – a good year is 8 barrels. This neighbours the last wine but with much bigger ‘plates’ of rock.
A more open nose, wider, with a practically vibrant blend of flowers and fruit – yes! A little extra volume and sweetness, slightly finer tannin, delicate, elegant but broad and complex too. Excellent!

2016 Charmes-Chambertin
More than 100 year-old vines – planted in 1910.
Ooh! Open, perfumed, beautiful fruit – yes! Volume, layers of expanding, melting, changing flavour. Not a wine of overt power but one of open-ended complexity and perspective – great and a finish of persistent finesse – bravo!

And some 2015s:

2015 Gevrey-Chambertin
Wide and beautifully perfumed. Silky, complex, great villages. Long – really great villages.
2015 Gevrey-Chambertin 1er Combe aux Moines
Ooh what a big nose – volume, super inviting and faintly floral – yes! Fresher, more direct than the nose suggests, melting fresh flavour, practically a little mineral, complex – great again. Super impressive finishing – just a suggestion of oak in the finish, but it will fade more – great again.
2015 Charmes-Chambertin
Ooh, deep, vibrant, pure – it’s not a shrinking violet but I can’t bring to mind anything that smells better than this in the last few months! Big but not oppressive, really super-silky texture, fresh but sitting calmly on the palate, melting at the edges, beautifully managed volume – primary but great. Grand vin. Resonances of finishing flavour.

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