It’s a light wine, reflective of it’s vintage. Highly floral nose, with bright strawberry fruit, it’s very lean initially in the mouth. All very light of foot and struggling to show it’s pedigree. But after an hour opened, it fleshes out a bit and comes to life in the mouth especially with the steak I drank it with strawberry and red currant, touch of greenness in the mouth. The fruit fleshes out in the mouth and becomes enjoyable. With that development of the fruit, the oak is present but not invasive, it gives a light light caramel element. At two hours it’s lost it’s lovely floral nose and without food, the acidity begins to come to the fore and the tannins are chewy.
The wine shows some inferiority in the raw materials, but obstensively is a well made wine. It drinks like a good negociant wine. It’s a firm 88. With the fruit profile, I can’t see it drinking any better than now.
Have opened 2 bottles of this wine and both flawed in my opinion. Stewed fruit, oak, overt reduction, and lack of any redeeming pinot quality. Not sure what happened here but in my limited experience don’t believe this one is of commercial quality.
Sounds cooked. There’s been hearsay about carelessness on Ray’s part that could be responsible. Or, it could’ve happened at some later point. Or, it could be some other cause/source of bottle variation. What I got 2 years ago was bright, clean, simple, reductive. I rated it 87+ points.
Appreciate your note, Sean–particularly your objectivity all things considered. I don’t read “cooked” from those notes, but thoughts? I think I have just the one of the Chaffots resting in my fridge.
BTW, I haven’t posted yet or on WinePages, but I’m back in London May 11-13…another lunch?
Definitely not cooked Mike. I think Cory was talking about his own bottle. I would think storage or transport issues might have come into play with his bottle.
There’s too much subjectivity in wine to let the negative emotions of this particular producer get in the way of the enjoyment of a bottle.To be honest I’ve been dreading opening one of my bottles for some time now. I am glad to have “popped my cherry”. From memory it is similar in profile to the barrel samples I tried back in October 2012, so maybe if you’re over and I can make it, I’ll bring one of the Charmes 11’s I have.
I’ll look forward to seeing you post on WP. La Trompette would be good for lunch, Chez Bruce for dinner
I figured you had some inside info suggesting Sanchez is about to sign a new contract and that Wenger’s departure is imminent, leading you to decide life was worth living again…
What is “obstensively”? I think you mean “ostensibly” which means “purportedly” which, in turn, gives a sort of dry (if unintended) humor to your post. “It is purportedly a well-made wine, but …”
Picking a nit here but I had no issue with the use of “ostensibly” because in addition to “purportedly” it could also mean “seemingly” or “outwardly”/“superficially”, which within the context of these wines makes sense.