Tasted on the border of Chassagne and Santenay, with Benoît Moreau, 25 February 2022.
Domaine Benoît Moreau
5 rue aligoté
Zac du pré fleury
21190 Chassagne-Montrachet
More reports with Domaine Benoît Moreau
Another chance to revisit a domaine I visited at the end of last year, and for Benoît’s vintage comments you can look here.
The wines…
I can only reiterate what I said in my November report – despite this being Benoît’s first vintage in his new cuverie, these are excellent wines – and some that are worthy of a special search – I came off of the fence for a couple and now think them great!
These 2020s were all small contract purchases, covering 10 different labels from Bourgogne to Grand Cru. It will be cork for all these wines – but Trescasses NDtech – Benoît plans to bottle, starting from March 2022:
2020 Bourgogne Blanc
This was declared as Bourgogne Côte d’Or – vines in the commune of Chassagne – but he’s not yet sure how it will be labelled. It was racked before harvest and is to be bottled next week.
Attractive agrume notes. Round but vibrant, clean, accommodating, even a faint tannin and bitters in the finish… A super start!
2020 St.Aubin 1er Champlots
A fine clarity of lemon citrus aroma. Wide, extra weight, extra mouth-watering. Clearly excellent wine!
A little more stony depth and width. Super silky – direct, not hard. Thats a top villages!
2020 Chassagne-Montrachet 1er Clos St.Jean
A little more oak is visible – creamy – but there’s floral complexity too. Round, wrapped with some barrel flavour, extra vibrant and mineral – really a super-impressive finishing wine. Give this 2 years before opening.
Ooh – that’s a beautifully broad nose. Hmm, super texture again, wide and great finishing. A wine of generosity but minerality and greatness too.
A sizzle of fresh citrus aroma. Ultra Fine grain of tannin and a mineral energy that both vibrates and invites. Bravo.
A deeper nose. Oh so gorgeous over the palate – liquid minerality but so smooth – great! Intense citrus touched with a little oak – close to great wine.
2020 Puligny-Montrachet 1er Combettes
More airy, more tension, less impact. Also beautifully textured width – more open and melting in flavour – there’s more floral perfume in this flavour. Completely different to the last but like the – perhaps 90% of everything that I could wish for from a wine… More than excellent…
2020 Corton-Charlemagne
From the Pernand side.
Fine, large-scaled, citrus bitters too in this nose – really super. Silk, concentration yet fluidity. The citrus bitters bring delicious accents. Super wine.
‘Just under the road, not the clay of lower down.’
An aromatic presence – rather than volume. Clearly a presence in the mouth too – with such a silky width. Just a zen-like great wine.