I headed to my local Bistro last night with a bottle of Fourrier Gevrey Chambertin VV 2001 in hand and their main of Partridge on my mind. There can be such pleasure from the simples things in life.
It’s a simple little place and I was aware that they had no decanters and upon opening, I detected that there was still some low level CO2 still dissipating in it. I poured and there was a little sound in the glass, wonderful nose and good initially in the palate.
After several vigourous shakes in the bottle and most of the CO2 gone, the nose wasn’t as pronounced as before, and one really had to go searching for the fruit in the mid palate.
My questions:
Firstly with a Fourrier of this age is the shake really necessary?
Why is this more of an issue with Fourrier wines than with other wines? Well, it goes back to the racking. Racking is when you move the liquid from one vessel in your cellar to another vessel. Usually when you rack, the CO2 gas goes away into the air as you move the wine. But Jean-Marie doesn’t like to rack. And so the carbon dioxide stays in the finished bottle of wine. Jean-Marie is cool with that, and in fact he prefers to use the carbon dioxide to protect the wine from oxidation instead of the alternative, which is sulphur. In the end the carbon dioxide is retained because the aim is to add very little sulphur.
i’ve found that the 2001s here are variable. might have been an off bottle. i decant my fourrier in advance if necessary. but i’ve also found they open up in the glass.
Are you saying this for 2001 generally, or just Fourrier? For I have found 2001 to be the most pleasurable of vintages thus far.
Anyhoo, my question was a Fourrier of this age where the CO2 was obvious, but not prominent, was there a necessity to shake. I feel in doing so, I made the wine more reductive as it closed down in the mid palate and to some extent on the nose.
I’ve had funky bottles of '01 Fourrier, including CSJ. I love Fourrier and love the vintage, but something didn’t go quite right at Fourrier in '01 in my view.
A
by “here” i meant fourrier. we agree, 2001 is a lovely vintage.
i wouldn’t think that any shaking would ever be preferred over just a normal decant to aerate. to me, 2001s are still on the young side and i don’t think most wines would fall apart from decanting.
my point was that it could be a funky bottle and have nothing to do with what you did.
Alex has it right also.
My very top-line view of Fourrier in that time period is that J-M was still in learning/transition mode and you see a lot of changes and, IMO, increase of quality post 2002. But 2003 and 2004 were both very challenging so, again IMO and very generally so please don’t flame, I think 2005 was the first vintage where everything was on track combined with a great vintage. Since then, the wines are much more consistent and generally excellent across the board.
To expand this a bit further, and I’ve gotten into some good debates over this, to me, pound-for-pound (meaning, on a portfolio basis) Fourrier is the best Gevrey producer. Now, they have a good advantage with so many local terroirs to play with. Maybe even more controversial, Bachelet is next and THEN Rousseau. But that’s a hornet’s nest.
I read the little article Adrian posted. I pretty much agree with everything Yaacov said.
When we visited Domaine Fourrier in June, someone raised the so-called Fourrier shake. Vicki Fourrier said that the idea had been blown up too big. Jean-Marie Fourrier apparently mentioned it in a podcast to a journalist once as something you can do if there is excess CO2 and it had become a manoeuvre named after him! She said he wishes that the idea had not taken on such a life of its own.
I’ve never done the shake, but, depending on age, Fourriers often benefit from decanting. Any CO2 I’ve ever seen in a Fourrier is just the most minor spritz and, if it was regarded as problem, can be dealt with by conventional decanting.
I very much like Fourrier, but I have found quite a bit of variability, bottle to bottle in the same wine. Unfortunately, its the price you seem to pay with the Domaine. But maybe it’s improving, they are certainly trying!
And I’d just about agree with Yaacov’s pound-for-pound assessment, so no big debate from me!
I don’t think Vicki was meaning any criticism of you, and I certainly was not meaning any. Your interview with Jean-Marie on “I’ll drink to that” is fascinating. I’d wholeheartedly recommend your podcast interview to anyone interested in Fourrier wines.