Potel’s 2002 Aloxe 1er Boutières…
There was a different type of value proposition when I was ‘peak buying.’ Following my tasting of Nicky’s 2002s in Nuits St.Georges (with his business manager Xavier) I ordered (from memory) 12 Aloxe Boutières, 6 Vosne 1er Suchots, 6 Vosne 1er Malconsorts, 6 Vosne… Read More
this week’s sequence of bottles…
2006 JF Mugnier, Nuits St.Georges 1er Clos de la Maréchale Of-course, the biggest disappointment is being able to say nothing at all about the wine – the cork was very smelly from TCA – the wine equally so… 2007 Prince Florent de Merode, Corton Clos du Roi… Read More
2018 Beaujolais: ‘This time the weather was with us!‘
2018 was a year with an early harvest and not much, but regular, rain after the 15th June – so the vines didn’t suffer from drought. It was ‘mainly’ too dry for the maladies in the summer, though. 2018 is the first vintage for a number of… Read More
the great grape launderette…
I’m reminded of more than one conversion I had with the former winemaker in Morey St.Denis, David Clark. His 2004s and 2011s were not immune to the pyrazines of those vintages, and in the absence of other theories that convinced, he seemed pretty comfortable with the… Read More
a bottle or two…
Just to show that I haven’t been ignoring my responsibilities these last couple of weeks – here’s the majority of bottles pulled from my own cellar in that time. I hold almost no notes in my head, but the basic impressions remain: The Armand Volnay was 2017, actually a… Read More
mark’s vosne harvest – day 8
Domaine Michel Noellat et Fils, Vosne-Romanee - Vendange Day Eight, Thurs 24th Sept 2019
The last official working day of the 2019 vendange for the picking team and one with a difference, in location, for the majority of the day at least. I was, at last, to also find out today why we hadn’t, to my slight frustration cum disappointment, picked any of the domaine’s Vosne premier crus, nor Savigny or Pommard vines – but that came much later in the day so hang on a little !
The first absolute confirmation I think now I had that today was indeed to be our collective last day came from fellow snorer room mate, and other sub team leader/chauffeur/porteur, Jean-Claude1, who mentioned it as we roused ourselves. In the same conversation the other member of our room triumvirate, Jean-Claude2, mentioned he’d be ‘shooting off’ later ( I understood at the end of the working day) & was gone after lunch, without staying for the Paulee (first tangible mention I’d heard of that also) as he was meeting his daughter somewhere else in France that evening. Read More
mark’s vosne harvest – day 2
Domaine Michel Noellat et Fils, Vosne-Romanee – Vendange Day Two 20th Sept 2019 After an ‘interesting’ first day, in more ways than one, Day Two opened with the ‘senior’ (in terms of number of vendanges) Jean-Claude room mate asking me if I’d slept well. I hadn’t actually, finding the bed… Read More
monday 23 Sept – harvest 2019 update
My home domaine finished their harvest on Thursday, and many others are also done, but that wasn’t the case in the Hautes Côtes, the Côte de Nuits or even Chablis and Beaujolais where they still had much work to do: On Friday the vast majority of the Côte de… Read More
Profile: Elodie Roy (Maranges)
Tasted in Cheilly-Les-Maranges with Elodie Roy, 24 June 2019. Domaine Elodie Roy 1B rue du Glacis 71150 Cheilly-Les-Maranges Tel: +33 6 87 16 27 32 Elodie’s father used to sell practically everything from the family domaine in bulk, but that’s about to change now that Elodie has… Read More