Wine Berserkers Weekly Burgundy Appellation Tasting Series Week 2: Gevrey-Chambertin+ V i d e o

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Ray,
Love the photos. Adds much more than just a written description and a classification lesson. Looking forward to the videos. I’ll pop something this week from G-C.

Thanks for leading this again this year, Ray. Really enjoy the photos. Looking forward to the next several weeks.

Ray, a great kick-off to Gevrey-Chambertin.

For reference, here is a link to the 2011 Gevrey thread.

Here is a link to the 2010 Gevrey thread.

Map of Gevrey-Chambertin.

Very cool, Ray. I, too, am looking forward to the videos. Thanks so much for doing this – it must be very time consuming. These threads are really great not only because they contain some terrific information and the posts and notes from others are informative, but also because they entice me to poke around a bit for more information. For example, the Marsannay/Fixin thread pushed me to find out more about Clos de la Perrière, review some of my old notes, look at my maps, etc. A great way to learn.

From Lavalle… Première Cuvée… Fouchère 1ha

I wonder what this refers to. Does anyone know? Very highly rated in 1855.

Coates has Fouchère going into Le Chambertin and Gemeaux into La Chapelle

A few fairly recent TNs:


Gevrey-Chambertin 2006
Cuvée Alexandrine
AOC Gevrey-Chambertin
(Côte-d’Or)
Domaine Marc Roy
13.5%
C: Nice bright translucent red.
N: Old tapestry (but not moldy).
P: Almost beyond elegant, light and smooth, with good length. A wine for fairies. A beautiful, beautiful wine. Very slight bitter note. At the end of the day, however, it makes one realize how much more a GC could be, this seems just and introduction. Excellent.

Vincent Girardin Charmes-Chambertin
Grand Cru 2002
14%.
P: Very very elegant. Completely integrated, no oak or tannin showing. Excellent.

That Cuvée Alexandrine is a superb Village but with recent pricing pushing it above top-shelf Gevrey 1ers from other producers it’s no longer a buy for me unfortunately.

Thank you Ray for the great work! The pictures are awesome and very informative. Last week I spent wondering how it was possible that I had zero bottles of Marsannay or Fixin and couldn’t participate in my favorite series. But starting this week I’m going to pop at least one bottle for each village to take a ride with all the others on a journey to discover Burgundy ever more deeply.

Here’s the first two TNs:

2008 Bachelet Gevrey-Chambertin Vieilles Vignes

Drinking great from the beginning. Very Gevrey in character with complex red and also darker fruits, meats and that tell-tale black minerality (that I always associate with Bachelet). A lovely structure with fresh acidity and fine intensity of fruit. Awesome wine as always, really a benchmark for a Gevrey village. I’ve been very lucky with the 2008 village wines recently and this bottle was perfectly in line with my belief that many of them are drinking superbly at the moment.


2010 Tortochot Gevrey-Chambertin 1er Cru Lavaux St-Jacques

The first 2010 Burgundy I’ve got my hands on and also my first ever bottle from this producer. A very nice nose of complex fruit and spicy oak. In the mouth this has excellent balance with concentrated fruit and fresh acidity. The mouthfeel is impressively smooth with noticable tannin that is very fine. The wine is a bit on the oaky side, but the oak is really quite classy (not too toasty) and completely in balance with the powerful, fresh fruit. Probably needs just some cellar time to integrate. The lenght of the aftertaste is a bit short, but otherwise this is clearly an excellent wine. The quality of the fruit is really something that raises my already high expectations for this vintage even higher. A nice example of a very good Gevrey 1er Cru.

I updated the first post with a video that is just short of 7 minutes in length. It was shot in 1080p but downscaled to 720p. I will have a full high def up in a few hours. Also, there are some movement glitches I am working on. But, at least we have more than photos. I imagine our 7th iteration of this cycle with have live feeds of each cru. One can dream…


Alright, so, now to Gevrey.

What do you personally feel is Gevrey’s strength?

Do you have any favorite crus?



Personally, I think consistency is one of the strengths of Gevrey. Just like in Morey, Chambolle, Vosne and Volnay, there aren’t many ways to go down a bad path here. There are many solid Village level wines that are striking and can offer great experiences for the prices paid.

Of note, my favorite village-level lieu dit vineyard is in Gevrey-Chambertin. Aux Echezeaux. This lieu dit was originally placed as a Deuxième Cuvée alongside many lieux dits that would eventually be classed as Grand Cru. Nonetheless, Aux Echezeaux is still classified as a Village wine. Unfortunately, many blend this wine into their Village Gevrey-Chambertin bottling.

In short, there are many treasures to find in Gevrey, especially off of the beaten path. For those looking to toe the shoreline prior to jumping in the deep end, buying a modest village level wine from 2000, 1998, 2001, 2006, or 2008 can yield Excellent results at present!

Rookie question. This is going to be something that I will likely ask throughout the weeks and it deals with the drinking windows. Although I know the great wines can age for decades, do you all have any personal guides as to when Gevrey-Chambertin should be opened (i.e., you can drink the village level wines right away but you should try and wait 5 years for PC and 10 for GC)?

Basically, what I want to try and get an idea about as we go through the weeks is how the three levels of wine develop within a particular region and also learn how the regions develop in relation to eachother (i.e. are Volnays better with only 3 years than a Gevrey or a Morey or a Chambolle, etc).

If this doesnt make sense, let me know and I can clarify.

2002 Vincent Girardin Gevrey-Chambertin V V

Initially picked up something not quite right on the nose (reduction?), but when I checked back about 90 minutes after opening it had blown off. Now a nose of dark red fruit, spices, iron and touch of underbrush. A lot of flavor on the palate. Ripe cherry, plum, tart red fruit with nice acidity and some prominent tannin on the finish. Flavors linger in a nice, long finish. Probably several years of upside. I may try to keep my hands off of a bottle or two for a while, but the rest of the case I plan to enjoy this year. Excellent village burg right now that was had for a reasonable price on release.

Ray, thanks for the video. I’ve been waiting eagerly for this thread to go “active” with a couple of my favorite bottles standing up for a week, but as it turns out, disappointment on all fronts…

Michel Esmonin 1993 Gevrey-Chambertin 1er Cru Clos Saint-Jacques. A wine that has always shown confusing bottle variation, some bottles among the greatest CSJ that I’ve ever experienced, and others from the same case showing muddled and simple. One year ago, a bottle was thrilling and magical, a grand cru experience from first pour to last sip. But last night, I got the other end of the scale, not just once, but from both bottles opened. I have no idea what went wrong, but clearly it was something at the domaine as the Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde character of this wine has been apparent for over a decade.

Further frustration, the Esmonin 1990 CSJ was corked…

I’ll say. It was $67 at a local wine store (and on close-out, IIRC). But it’s a Burg, what can you expect?

Thanks, Lew. Still figuring this DSLR out for video. I shot most of this on the fly without a tripod while in the rain. I will reshoot soon with proper settings, tripod, and no rain.

I think you should open up another bottle.

From late January 2012…

Jean-Marie Fourrier 1999 Griottes-Chambertin Grand Cru. Medium color moving toward garnet. The lovely bouquet is floral, earth, stones. Light and agile on the palate but very intense, stoney with ripe red cherries (indeed griottes). Lovely velvet texture. Lingers long on the fine-grained finale. This is very fresh, but maybe less complex than I recall from two years ago. Outsatnding, ready IMO but no hurry.

And a few days later…

Jean-Marie Fourrier 1999 Gevrey-Chambertin 1er Cru Clos Saint-Jacques. A lovely perfume even as the wine is poured, damp earth and cherries and stones, draws me in with depth and class and complexity even beyond the recent '99 Griottes-Chambertin. Airy and elegant yet intense, a prima ballerina of grace and beauty. Stones and earth and awesome ethereal beauty. Exceptional, grand cru, next 10-15 years.

Hey Jimmy,
the only problem with ‘rookie’ questions is when they aren’t asked.

Long-ish answer:

My take on this will undoubtedly be in the minority since I prefer to drink wines on the more mature side. In fact, as with a good many questions, the most ‘accurate’ answer might be, ‘it depends’. In the case of when to drink, drinking windows, etc, the most opportune time to drink depends equally on the wine and the preferences of the taster alike. Now, what we can do is take a look at what can generally happen with these wines in their life. I look at the wines having a unique life because each is quite unique. It is important to note that even though a wine can have the same or similar terroir DNA, that the choices made in the vineyard and in the cellar provide enough degrees of change in a wine that the generalities that may be suggested here may lose some of their intended value. One example is with extraction and oak. Just these two factors can bring so many more variables into how the wines will age and express themselves at different stages of development.

I believe that one of the greatest virtues of Burgundy is the celebration of unique sites and their resulting expressions. Many of these characteristics only truly show themselves clearly after a ‘certain’ amount of time. The certain amount of time is the catch, as no one time is certain to be best. Another of Burgundy’s strengths is in change and development. This can be seen in cases with a glass resting in front of you as well as over time in bottle. Unfortunate as it is, Burgundy can taste delicious when young. I say that it is unfortunate because it is due to this perceived generosity is in most cases nothing but mere baby fat, cute to look at, but it lacks in definition which comes with age.

For many, this baby fat is good enough of a temptation and reason enough to open a bottle. However, what will most likely be missing is the framework of the wine that speaks of a certain place. In most cases, as you move from the Bourgogne level classification set towards the Grand Cru set, you will have more of this barrier blocking the view to the wine’s eventual destination when tasted young. Of course, there may be flash that suggests what may come in time even when tasting a Grand Cru early on. But, the distance that a wine needs to travel to reach this theoretical point of perceived maturation is much greater for a Grand Cru than a Village wine. With this in mind, it is completely possible that in a given range of wines, in the early stages of development, that the more interesting wine in a cellar is the Village or Premier Cru wine, not the Grand Cru. If drinking a Premier and Grand Cru early simply for pleasure is of interest, you could actually do nearly as good (if not better in some cases) by opening a Village wine from the same producer. It is only with sufficient age that Premier and Grand Crus show why they are truly special, aside from shallow bouts of expression.

Vintage plays a tremendous role in this as well. It seems clear that certain vintages express more or less of this youthful cuteness than others. 2008 and 2010 would be recent vintages that are showing more depth of terroir (meaning that the wines in a given producer’s lineup that the wines are more singular, each expressing what makes them unique) than wines from a vintage such as 2002 or 2009 (just to name a few). This is not to say that these vintages don’t or won’t show terroir, but the skeletal system is hidden behind much more material. This, of course, further complicates any attempts at creating generalities.

Your point about villages and their respective windows is an interesting point. I think it still depends on the preferences of the individual taster. A young Chambolle can be pretty or powerful and delightful young in both cases to some while others may crave what could be possible with more time in bottle.

With all of this mentioned, you still need to drink the wine at some point, right?

While this is not a general rule by any means, this is what I do if I am drinking for something other than tasting baby fat:

My preference is:

Bourgogne: anytime, but drink before 15 years after harvest. Some of these wines have village classed fruit in them. Also, many Bourgognes are from plots adjacent the village of the producer instead being spread throughout the Côte. The detail and intensity of place will be less clear at this level, but often a glimpse of the nearby village can come into focus. These reach maturity quickly and generally aren’t bargains relative to Village level wines, but exceptions can be found.

Village: starting 3-5 years after harvest, these can age (maturing with development) extremely well. Lieux Dits(a named place, vineyard in this instance) give a chance to know the potential with more accuracy. These can be the highlight of a great night of wines. While these wines do develop with age, there is a plateau that is reach much quicker than those in the Premier and Grand Cru levels and the potential of fine detail that is possible will generally be much lower than at the Premier Cru level, aside from a collection of fascinating, overachieving lieux dits.

Premier Cru: Starting 5-7 years after harvest, can often age as well as (and in some cases better than some Grand Crus). Potential to stun relative to price is greatest here. Drinking one of these young can result in a wine that displays more unique characteristics than a Village level wine, but the detail which separates this group from the village-classed wine aren’t immediately on display.

Grand Cru: Starting 10-12 years after harvest, these can be drank by the next two generations with confidence. These are the most unique terroirs in theory, and the most consistently fine wines, not necessarily the ‘best’* wines. Drinking one of these young cannot result in knowing a majority percentage of why a particular terroir has been classified at this level. In short, I don’t buy at this level unless I am sure to wait the preferred amount of time. It is more than money that you lose when opening a Grand Cru or Premier Cru early, you miss out on a potentially extraordinary experience.

• My view is that Burgundy is best as seen as a celebration of subtle to striking differences, not of degrees of greatness.
  
  
  Short answer:
  No one really knows when the right time to open a bottle is. Drinking windows are typically of the most help to the person who penned them. To get more of what is promised in the concept and culture of the wines from Burgundy, please try to be as patient as you can. In their youth, they can all be delicious and flirty while completely speaking around the topic of their origins or what they may become in time. In short, while young wines can be attractive, they are generally full of themselves and absolutely clueless.

Cheers

Ray

When I first started drinking Burgundy, I thought of GC as an area that was difficult as there were lots of underperforming producers. Now, it seems like this is an area with just a bevy of great producers. Obviously, there is Rousseau. My favorite of course used to be Truchot (still is actually, he just isn’t making more wines). Current producers I really like include Jadot, Rossignol-Trapet, Bachelet, and Fourrier. Of these, Jadot and Rossignol-Trapet really provide great value. I am looking forward to getting my Maison Ilan from these vines. From what I have tasted, they will be great.

And, from what little I have tasted (mostly 1999s), Tortochot (mentioned above) is a good under the radar producer.

Ray gives you a great response. But, I would emphasize vintage as much as if not more than village here. If you want wines to be drunk very enjoyably on the younger side, buy 2000s or 2007s. If you want to hold wines for a long time that will eventually be great, buy 2005s. Everything else is somewhere in between.