2023 Roland Lavantureux, Chablis Vau Renard
Plenty of colour. Depth and ripeness of atoms – I’m not sure that I’d say Chablis, blind. In the mouth though, there’s minerality to balanc the generosity and plenty of salinity too – yes it’s a wine of Chablis, but a generous one…
Rebuy – No

2005 Michel Lafarge, Beaune 1er Grèves
Plenty of colour. The nose is An attractive blend of depth and freshness. Mouth-filling and very wide – framed with slightly drying, young, tannin – but grainless. Finishing flavours with plent of bitters and salinity. What a young wine! I shall continue to enjoy it, whilst mentally noting ‘not for 5 more years’ for the next bottle!
Rebuy – Maybe

The tasting room at Henri Gouges was showing a new vintage this week – so why not? 😊

Mainly 2022s, except for the Les St.Georges…

2022 Nuits St.Georges 1er Les Chênes Carteaux
Top of the hill above Les St.Georges etcetera…
Plenty of colour but still transparent. Really open, rounded with a ripe fruit – a little cherry in style but an accent of florals and some herb in that style too. Lovely in the mouth – quite silky and fluid too. The last flavours have plenty of length and a modest touch of bitters. This is already very attractively drinkable.

2022 Nuits St.Georges 1er Clos des Porrets St.Georges
Still a little extra colour. An extra herb – but bouquet-garni – and with a larger scale to this nose, more cherry-stone than cherry, with a small strawberry lift – that’s a great invitation. Extra width, extra flavour energy and complexity too – a big step up in flavour energy here – what an excellent and surprisingly approachable wine. More chalky tannic dryness right at the end – much extra personality after the Chênes. What a simply excellent wine…

2022 Nuits St.Georges 1er Les Pruliers
More powder, high-toned and a little more austere – with air, the aromas are going much deeper. Hmm, the most fluid, and also a little more juicy – some citrus-style bitters – this is more obviously a baby, but I could still drink it. Lovely concentration despite the fluidity. You could carafe and enjoy today, but here I’d wait another 2-3 years…

2022 Nuits St.Georges 1er Les Vaucrains
Another aromatic with excellent scale – powdery, stony fruit here. Hmm, but this is rather an elegant Vaucrains – lots of tannin but also of velour – wow – the first time I tasted a young Vaucrains that’s so approachable – it might be silly to say ‘ready’ – but I would drink this today and certainly ahead of the Pruliers. What an excellent wine…

2022 Nuits St.Georges 1er La Perrière (Blanc)
A generous width of fine citrus, though not overly ripe citrus. A juicy, mouth-watering, palate-cleansing delicious wine. This 22 is still showing some of the textural padding and flavours of the barrel – but it’s delicious with a last twist of tannic dryness on the tongue – chalkiness, as there’s no grain…

Trapet Gevrey 1er Capita

Château de Fleys, Mont de Milieu

2017 Trapet, Gevrey-Chambertin 1er Capita
A blend of three 1ers. Not made every year…
An enveloping cushion of fruit and still some vanilla aroma. Like the nose, supple and cushioned – great texture and a slowly mouthwatering stony last flavour. Holding very long. A young wine, and I’d like the vanilla to fade more, but this is still completely delicious…
Rebuy – Yes

2022 Château de Fleys, Mont de Milieu
I was a little late in discovering the wines of this domaine, but here is a fine example of what I’ve been missing! Not all is planted at this time, but this domaine has over 5 hectares in this appellation – I assume that they are the largest owner of Mont de Milieu…
A forward and attractive yellow citrus, ripe but still fresh. Beautiful entry, super-mineral, but also with a width to that stony minerality. A modest ripeness – of the right bank and/or the vintage – but nothing out of place. What a classy Chablis.
Rebuy – Yes

2023 Roc des Boutrires, Pouilly-Fuissé
An attractively pale colour. Cushioned fresh citrus – richer at the core. Hmm, a generous wine – it coats the palate with flavour. It could be more incisive, but this flavour is good. Slowly fading. A good wine, but not a wine to search out.
Rebuy – No

2022 Beaujolais Villages Aux Gauthiers
My last bottle. Vines near the Col des Truges – a shame that this exploitation is no more…
Still great, young colour. An inviting dark fruit, and I like this energy too. Tasty, young and juicy. Holding well. There’s a small deposit in the bottle – maybe the last of the tannins – as I didn’t find any in the wine. Delicious !!
Rebuy – Yes

The 2019 Champagne? Well, pinot meunier is not my favourite, maybe thanks to that, there were some high-toned esters I didn’t like – but what a wine! Powerful, intense and very long with a strong salinity. This was absolutely a wine that had to be drunk – none left for day two – and also a wine I might consider buying 😉

2022 JJ Archambaud, Vosne-Romanée Aux Réas
Lots of colour. Still a cherry-purple rim. A deep and concentrated nose, unfortunately with quite a lot of creamy oak today – that’s not unfortunate for the future, but my bottle is open today! Wide, intense, a first texture that’s silky but slowly adds some bitters too. Saline, ultra-wide finishing. This is a powerful wine but clearly a bit too young for drinking (with pleasure) today…
Rebuy – Maybe

Two 1999s – currently one of my favourite vintages, but not for these two! Both have been stored in the same corner of the cellar for many years. Every wine will be different, and mainly due to the quality of their corks:

1999 Camille Giroud, Bourgogne En Crêots
A wine-saturated cork, though I only broke the first cm. The cork itself smells of oxidised wine – but for older wines (usually 30 years older!) – that’s often the case for a wine-saturated cork, and it doesn’t mean that the wine will be the same.
Medium, medium-plus colour – and no cloudiness. No, there’s hardly any oxidation. Unfortunately, there’s a bit of brett. Direct, silky, plenty of acidity, but also an interesting depth of flavour with a slight accent of oxidation, but no flavour of brett. Long, quite direct and intense finishing. Holding impressively long, a metallic, blood-iron type of flavour, still with some subtle bitters – but no tannic grain. This was potentially a bit of a brute for the first few (15?) years of its life, but it seems quite drinkable – and with a better cork, this would probably be a super Bourgogne.
Rebuy – No but with a better cork, probably.

1999 Michel Gay, Beaune 1er Les Toussaints
What a great cork! Just 2mm of colour from wine ingress – and it comes out in one piece too!
The basic colour is similar to that of the Giroud, but here it’s cloudy and with plenty of sediment that hasn’t settled in 48 hours of ‘uprightness.’ To add to the cloudiness, there’s a pervasive note of brett – really as much as I’ve smelled in a wine for a long time – DNPIM*
Rebuy – No

*Do Not Put In Mouth !!

Old wine

New wine

Frozen wine

Drunk wine

Corked wine

Some tasted wine

Chablis

Time for Chablis honey

Frozen but good

And a good cork too…

Last week I was in Chablis – not too cold and not too wet. Unfortunately, the refrigerator in my chambre d’hôte was set way too cold !! So cold, in fact, that two of my bottles froze in there!

The Leroy – the last of a case of 12 – almost lost its cork completely. Truth be told, it was of no loss as the wine was completely corked – yuk – but it was the only bad wine from this case. The Bonnes-Mares fared much better – it was delicious…

It was not the only wine though:

2022 de Moor, Chablis 1er Montmains – delicious, slightly apple fruit aroma as always at this domaine – but a wine of concentration and fruit6 but also of minerality and ‘place!’
2022 Vincent Dauvissat, Chablis 1er Fourneaux – a new wine here since 2021, lost for a couple of years but returning in 2025. A subtle aromatic ripeness of fruit, but a wine of architecture and minerality – it’s a Dauvissat !!
1998 Fougeray de Beauclair, Bonnes-Mares – A fine, robust cork That survived the wine being frozen! Medium colour. Complex and ‘ready’ aromas. Not the power – or tannin – of its youth. But delicious, complex, almost easy drinking…
2021 Alain Geoffroy, Chablis 1er Beauroy (Mag) – Deep but fresh citrus! Open, deliciously energetic and complex, with a little salinity too. A crowd-pleaser !!
2013 Château Mopulin à Vent, Moulin à Vent Croix des Vérillats (Mag) – A beautiful depth of complex, slightly spiced aromas – plenty of attractive development here too. Easy-going, delicious wine – not ultra complex but delicious, easy drinking…

On Friday, April 24, the 2026 Excellence Awards tasting for the Bourgogne Hautes-Côtes de Beaune and Bourgogne Hautes-Côtes de Nuits wines was held in Beaune. For over 70 years, this tasting has brought together the best wines produced in the high-altitude vineyards of these two regional appellations.

In 2026, 101 cuvées were tasted by a panel of 31 judges. 13 cuvées from the Hautes-Côtes de Beaune received awards, and 20 from the Hautes-Côtes de Nuits. That’s too high a percentage for them all to be ‘Great Wines’ but I’d expect these wines to be very good/delicious examples of pinot noir and chardonnay with accessible pricing in the context of burgundy wines…

The 2026 winners follow below…

**Press Release | April 2026**

The 2026 Excellence Awards in Figures

101 cuvées were presented in 2026:
Bourgogne Hautes-Côtes de Beaune: 54
Bourgogne Hautes-Côtes de Nuits: 47

33 cuvées received the 2026 Excellence Award:
Bourgogne Hautes-Côtes de Beaune: 13 wines, including 7 whites and 6 reds
Bourgogne Hautes-Côtes de Nuits: 20 wines, including 9 whites and 11 reds

The 2026 Tasting, Award-Winning Wines

DOMAINE BERGER RIVE – MANOIR DE MERCEY
Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Beaune, Au Paradis, rouge, 2024
DOMAINE BORIS CHAMPY
Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Beaune, Montagne 382, blanc, 2024
DOMAINE CARRE REGAZZONI
Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Beaune, Champ de la foire, rouge, 2024
CHÂTEAU DE LABORDE
Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Beaune, En Cuillery, rouge, 2024
VINS COUDURIER JUNG
Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Beaune, Notre Marie, blanc, 2023
DOMAINE DE LA COZANNE
Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Beaune, Le Ban, blanc, 2023
DOMAINE CRUCHANDEAU
Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Nuits, Les Valançons, rouge, 2024
Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Nuits, Les Valançons, rouge, 2022
DOMAINE GUY ET YVAN DUFOULEUR
Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Nuits, Les Dames Huguettes, rouge, 2024
Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Nuits, La Réserve de Cyprien, rouge, 2023
DOMAINE ALAIN-MAURICE GAVIGNET
Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Nuits, Les Dames Huguettes, blanc, 2024
Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Nuits, Les Dames Huguettes, rouge, 2024
DOMAINE MICHEL GROS
Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Nuits, Fontaine Saint Martin, blanc, 2023
Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Nuits, Au Vallon, rouge, 2023
Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Nuits, Fontaine Saint Martin, rouge, 2023
DOMAINE HOFFMANN JAYER
Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Nuits, blanc, 2023
Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Nuits, rouge, 2023
Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Nuits, Rosalie, rouge, 2023
DOMAINE DU LYCÉE VITICOLE DE BEAUNE
Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Beaune, Le Mont Battois, blanc, 2023
Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Beaune, rouge, 2023
Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Beaune, rouge, 2024
DOMAINE MONGEARD MUGNERET
Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Nuits, Les Dames Huguettes, rouge, 2024
NUITON BEAUNOY CAVE DES HAUTES COTES
Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Nuits, Le Prieuré, blanc, 2024
MANUEL OLIVIER
Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Nuits, blanc, 2024
DOMAINE PANSIOT
Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Nuits, blanc, 2025
MAISON PROSPER MAUFOUX
Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Beaune, Domaine du Château de Saint Aubin, blanc, 2023
Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Beaune, Domaine du Château de Saint Aubin, rouge, 2023
Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Nuits, Domaine Vigne au Roy, blanc, 2023
Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Nuits, Domaine Vigne au Roy, rouge, 2023
DOMAINE REGNARD
Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Beaune, blanc, 2024
DOMAINE JEAN-CHARLES RION
Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Nuits, Les Millottes, blanc, 2023
Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Nuits, Les Millottes, blanc, 2022
DOMAINE TRENET PÈRE ET FILS
Bourgogne Hautes Côtes de Beaune, La Gascogne, blanc, 2024