Tasted with Didier Picq in Chichée, 05 April 2022.
Domaine Gilbert Picq et Fils
3 route de Chablis
89800 Chichée
Tel: +33 3 86 42 18 30
More reports with Domaine Gilbert Picq
Didier on 2022:
“I’m not sure about this year – in some places it will be as bad as last year, in others certainly not. It was the Saturday night that will have caused us more problems – despite it being colder on the Sunday – because Saturday was wetter.”
Didier on 2020:
“52 hl/ha I’d take that each year – no question – and with harvesting in August too! Everything is now bottled but the most recent was only last week. The wines remind me of 2017 despite harvesting in August – no wines passed 13° and most are closer to 12.5°”
The wines…
The start was shaky with a little greenery in the first wine – then it was simply a range of greatness – bravo!
All the wines are sealed with cork:
2020 Chablis
A small but attractive width of aroma. Mouth-filling flavour containing a little of the greens and some nice citrus bitters. Fine finishing…
Same soil as Vaucoupin, usually lots of millerandes. This from the right bank.
This is more open and perfumed – that’s a really great invitation. Wide, vibrant, super flavour with growing intensity That’s a really fine wine – more vibrant, more mineral more chalky finishing. More than excellent – a super wine!
From vines of 60 years old from 3 parcels – represents almost 1 hectare, more right bank.
More flowers in this aroma and a base of stony reduction. Larger scale – really mouth-filling – despite its small reduction this is very, very attractive. Concentrated, mineral, more 1er cru in level. Bravo – but wait!
Same soil as the first wine but with a small change in the orientation. This in bottle 3 weeks. Only magnums of this in 2021 as there was hardly a quarter of the normal volume
A faint spice, almost in the direction of aniseed, some menthol – here is a complex nose! Broad, more austere – super structure though never hard – faintly wrapped in chalky tannins. Super, super…
Bottled last week
A more saline width of aroma. A little reductive, direct and mineral in the mouth. But opening out with bravado. That’s a great, great finish, growing more saline in this beautifully mouth-watering finale. Bravo!
Did I say that all were bottled? This is from tank – ‘it’s not yet filtered and it surely needs lots of air – it’s brute, brute – bottling in May, perhaps’
Oh yes – a noble reduction here and a wine that’s impressively open. Wide, silkier, almost (but not quite) softer. A wine of power and weight. Super fresh – a little silex smokiness. Not the ultimate precision of the premiers – but they are bottled and this is not yet at the same stage – but a wine that still follows them with much style – I think also bravo!
And to finish:
Not too much colour. Hmm – that’s nice – floral but with some age-related development. Hmm (again!) that’s broad, faintly creamy, deeply flavoured – not a hint of the vintage asparagus. That’s a great 2011 – broad and interesting, young even, vibrant finishing.