Burgundy drinking windows question

Clive Coates

Some answers on Pages 30 and 31 under: “Notes for Consumers”

RT

Serge – The 1996s are tannic, backward wines that generally need a lot of time. So don’t give up hope for other vintages based on 96 (or 93 or 95). A few are beginning to enter their drinking windows (e.g., a Lamarche Vosne-Suchots I had a year ago) but I’m holding off on mine. See http://dat.erobertparker.com/bboard/showthread.php?t=208794" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; (discussion of drinkable and not-yet-drinkable 96s).

Nuits St. Georges tends to produce firmer, more masculine wines than most of the other communes on the Cotes de Nuits, so I’m not surprised that a 96 Chevillon isn’t yet drinking well.

You should have better luck with the 99s in general, many of which have drunk well all along. A lot depends on the vineyard and the producer, though. A Vosne I had recently was just beginning to open up. TN: Potel 1999 Vosne - Malconsorts - WINE TALK - WineBerserkers" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false; (Potel Vosne-Malconsorts) Again, I wouldn’t expect Chevillon’s wines to be the most forward.

I have little experience with the 2000 vintage, but many people have reported that they are drinking well – and much better than people expected early on. If you’re concerned about living to drink your wines (I’m 52, too, so I can relate), you might want to back-fill with older, approachable vintages, particularly given how depressed the dollar is right now.

'96 Domaine Maillard Corton-Renardes has been drinking beautifully over the past year.

As far as rushing to acquire 09s…“we’ll see, says the Zen Master” (to quote Phillip Seymour Hoffman in “Charlie Wilson’s War”). Not in any way implying that I’m a master of any sort in this field…as this board has plenty of them…just that from the limited view of this consumer, there still seem to be a good amount of respectable unsold Burgs around.

RT

personally–and I mean personally–too many people drink their wines too young. At 53 and a lover of Burgundy with at least two decades of age, I stopped buying red Burgs w/the 2005 vintage. Even if 2009 is the greatest vintage of our lifetime, it makes no point to me to buy wine that will not be ready in my lifetime. My kids will have enough wine to drink and I’d rather backfill. I might buy the occasional or few bottles for education and because this passion keeps one wanting to learn, but I won’t stock up like I did with other “great” vintages. But, as I started out this reply, it’s all personal . . .
alan

Had a few Burgs with friends last night over a meal spanning 5 hours. The 93 Volnay from Pousse d’Or was lovely from the get go and opened over the evening as did the Rousseau Clos St Jacques from the same vintage. The 99 Gros Freres Grand Echezaux was nice on opening and got significantly better in the decanter. The 2002 Drouhin Petit Monts was lovely, but rather linear and more about fruit than secondary, more complex flavors.

From an actuarial standpoint, perhaps all us 50-somethings ought to be switching to Central Coast pinot. No?

Was the Pousse the village?

I have a few '93s, but all upper-tier wines, and I’m doubting that they are ready. If only I’d had the sense when I was younger to buy some of their sensational Tavannes.

It was the Clos de la Bousse d’Or. Lovely stuff. My last bottle of the 93 sadly.

Either young or with age is how I like to drink Burgundy. Then it’s all personal and also depends a lot on the wine, the winemaker, etc… rule of thumb is either within 2 years of making and then about 10 years after…

I’ll be heavy on 2009 Burgs. Like I have been for 2005 and 2007 in particular. But wait, I’ve also bought a lot in 2004… and in 2006 and 2008… oh well…

I was quite interested to see this topic and the various points of view expressed. As someone who has a bit of experience with this subject, I can tell you that it’s largely a fool’s errand providing this kind of advice absent knowing the cellar conditions in which the bottle in question will be stored and the drinker’s proclivities. Personally, I share Alan’s preferences for well-aged burgs, be they red or white but I know people who believe that if there is a cork in the bottle, the wine is ready. While an extreme example, I know of another very high-end red burg collector who never ever allows a bottle to see its fifth birthday.

But that’s not the advice that I dispense in the pages of Burghound. There, I try to estimate when a wine will begin to display secondary aromas and have reasonably evolved tannins. Even this though requires a steady-state assumption about (essentially perfect) storage conditions and impeccable delivery requirements (neither of which is always the case). Still, from good vintages and with the better premiers crus and grands crus, I’m somewhere between 12 and 25 years to begin drinking. Well-made villages wines are in a 6 to 10 year window for my tastes, depending of course on vintage, producer and appellation differences.

I have to laugh sometimes though because there are those who comment (on various fora) that no burgundy reviewers ever have drinking windows that are sufficiently long (in fairness, there were two prominent reviewers who did offer notoriously short windows). And then recently, I was specifically taken to task by an observer who said “Meadows doesn’t appear to ever want you to drink what you buy. I wonder if he even likes wines?”

In short, it’s a very personal decision and none of them are wrong. Personally (I stress that term again), I believe that you’re not getting what you pay for with top-flight burgs if you don’t allow the flavors and textures to develop but if there is one thing that I have learned in my years of doing this it’s that you can’t predict how everyone will enjoy what they buy. In fact, I would say that the ‘when to drink it’ question is the most common that I receive. And for several years now I have adopted the position that “if you’re in the mood to drink a specific bottle, then it’s time to open it.” I say this because if someone has the passion and the curiosity to open a specific bottle, then the wine will get what it deserves, which is the full engagement of the drinker.

Allen

Very sensible and elegantly put observations, Allen.

This is just a fascinating example of the godlike powers people want in their wine critics - as if the drinking windows you provide reflect your desires and if only you had wanted the wines to be ready sooner, you could have written as much, and so it is written, so it shall be done!

Reality beckons… the youngest of the top Burgundy vintages I consider generally ready to drink is 1985, so I figure 20 years in the bottle is a good estimate for the beginning of a drinking window.

Nice thread…good points Allen made and I agree it’s fruitless to give advice to those who don’t want it, but having a drinking window helps me narrow it down in some cases…for the most part I like Burgs with 10 yrs + age on them

Absolutely. Very wise words.

Re. storage conditions, a very important factor indeed, my assumption is that if you really care about the wine, you will give it the storage conditions it deserves: perfect.

Hi Allen - It’s great to see you checking in here and contributing. I hope you stick around. And fwiw, I think drinking windows should be exactly how Allen describes. A measure of when to expect secondary and tertiery flavors to develope and tannins to settle down.

Threads like these are what made me really enjoy forums over the years. Everyone has their own opinion and there is no issue. Also, speaking about a topic such as this and having Allen step in as someone in our same pair of shoes is quite cool.

Alan, like others said,we hope you stick around.

For my perspective, I love old red Burgundy but on my deathbed I would like to see what was next on the hopper and interested in trying the recent and developing vintages.

Allen, once again you’ve articulated it better than I could have hoped to. I’m also of the opinion that one doesn’t get the best of what top Burgs truly have to offer until they’ve been allowed to develop the secondary aromas, flavors and textures.

It’s an interesting perspective from here in our tasting room, where often customers are exposed to good Burgundy for the first time. Being mostly accustomed to New World wines that deliver big fruit and pleasure right out of the gate, many are, not surprisingly, skeptical to hear that the wine in question truly needs another 5-10-15 years to be at it’s best, as the case may be.

Unless one has had the pleasure of drinking a great Burg at full maturity, it’s hard to understand where these wines are going. You need a reference point - that epiphany bottle - to fully get it, I think. Unfortunately, it’s not terribly practical to keep a stash of '85 Jayer Richebourg or '47 de Vogüé Musigny on hand to illustrate the point…

At the end of the day, I find I’m much more often disappointed by opening a bottle too early than by waiting too long. Hold those suckers and let them show you what they’ve really got!

Scott Wright
Scott Paul Wines-Scott Paul Selections

Alan,

What happens when you are 75 and healthy and want good wine to drink.

Thanks for the interesting thread, everyone. I certainly don’t have anywhere near the experience of many of the posters on this thread, but I have found it’s very easy to fall into a mindset where nearly every wine (well, nearly every red burg) seems like it needs more time to show its full colors. While this is probably true, it also makes it easy to dismiss the wine, in a way, as “not ready”. Yet I feel like I’ve learned something and derived some pleasure from every red burg I’ve opened, which makes me feel that there’s a lot of value to be had from the early side of the maturity curve. This of course doesn’t mean I’m not holding my most age-worthy bottles until they’re at least 15, but I guess it means I won’t be too disappointed if they end up being “not ready” then.

Scott,
It’s great to see you participating on this board as well. Here’s hoping you stick around and offer insight on your wines, imports, and everything else too.

What about the climate-challenged '98 vintage? I’m seeing some interesting reviews on 1er Cru '98’s.