Well, the 2007 Camille Giroud Cazetiers was simply brilliant; a floral-inflected fruit of freshness and purity that you rarely find in an 07. I drank this over two nights – with massive joy. The 2006 Chenu Savigny Lavières was a lighter wine – in both intensity, concentration and colour! Yet it was a delightful ‘small’ wine that well-showed the earthy-flavoured characteristics of a good Lavières – of-course if you’re looking for a concentrated Lavières, you would be better choosing Chandon de Briailles, Bouchard Père or Tollot-Beaut – though you need a hint more oak tolerance for those latter two wines. Then we have the 2000 Jean-Marc Boillot Pommard 1er Jarollières – a wine that, over the years, I’ve found to be highly variable and sometimes bretty. This was a very good one; strawberry-fruited aromatics and a nice width of decently concentrated and well-textured flavour. This Jarollières was really enjoyed.

Lastly, my final M&M, the 2007 Puligny-Montrachet 1er Les Caillerets (again!) This bottle, like the last, delivers a deeply coloured wine but without any obvious oxidation. Like the last, and surprisingly given the vintage, it shows quite some fat – and certainly a very impressive volume in the mouth. It’s very complex without actually being moreish – for that you would certainly have to wait for a higher level of maturity – give this summer’s experiences of the M&M 2005s, that’s not a ship that I would personally sail on, but this is an impressive wine all the same!

A chance weekend tasting 😉
Whilst the local pricing is rather high, these wines really do have more than a pretension to be high-value wines these days…

2013 Beaune 1er Les Grèves
Optical sorting with 3 different cameras, foudres too since 2013
A really super depth of aroma – clearly edged with oak notes, but this nose is really inviting. Good volume in the mouth, fresh fruit, lots of complexity too. This is very tasty, the oak component is not too overt and seems quite attractive here.

2013 Pommard 1er Clos des Epenots
A more obvious floral aroma, pretty, though cushioned red fruit. Layered, complex, very faintly salted – I find this very much more elegant and gorgeously tasting than the Beaune. A long line of flavour, faintly herbed, but fabulous!

2013 Volnay 1er Clos des Chênes
‘The only plot in Volnay where you will find white marl – something much more common in the Côte de Nuits’ – says our host…
A deep nose of dark red fruit, faintly herbed. Lovely mouth-feel – there is a tannin that you can chew, almost, but velvet and no dryness. A wine of more volume than the Epenots, but super, super in the mouth.

2013 Corton
A faintly smoky-fruited nose, but there are no stems. Pure silk – hmmmm… This has fine freshness and a cushioned delivery of flavour. Really not the most powerful of Cortons and rounder rather than direct and sinewy – but really something to appreciate in the glass. More mineral and faintly saline in the finish. Super stuff to drink, already!

Whites

2014 Bourgogne Clos du Château
From the vines planted in the front ‘garden’ of the Château.
A discreet nose, rounded. Fresh, direct, round – a growing complexity with a slowly growing mouth-watering aspect. A sneakily good wine.

2014 Meursault 1er Charmes
A wide fresh, not super-powerful nose, but I find the width super. Hmm, layered, growing in volume. Just a great wine. Some tightness but really a rather haunting length – just a brilliant wine in the making.

2012 Meursault 1er Perrières
A bigger, rounder nose, accented with a faint barrel vanilla. Big, clearly mineral, layered and complex – honestly I’d like just a hint more acidity, but that won’t matter at all in a couple more years.

2013 Puligny-Montrachet 1er Champs Canet
A lovely bright bouquet of fresh yellow citrus. Silky, mineral, very silky – this is lovely. What a super and elegant wine. Excellent!

Quite a ‘classical’ weekend selection:

2000

2007

2007

More concise reflections/recollections than full tasting notes:

The Faiveley 2000 Mazis-Chambertin wore a normal Faiveley label to the front, but a Tastevinage label to the rear. This opened up very slowly from an ultra-discreet start to something that opened out ever-wider on the palate. Not an amazingly complex wine, and not a hairy-chested Mazis either – but really a tasty and surprisingly elegant one – even the sediment was tasty 🙂
Next up, the 2007 Clos des Epeneaux – decanted! This started as typical direct, sinewy Clos des Epeneaux – typically unyielding. About 30+ minutes in the decanter and it was starting to become more friendly and certainly more interesting.
Similarly the 2007 Forge de Tart was also decanted – in this case to aerate and hopefully reduce aromatic and flavour aspects imparted by the wood elevage. It needed at least 30 minutes to have some effect, but I must say that, eventually, this was my favourite wine of three – really a fine and complex nose, a wine of power and enjoyment. Yum!