La Paulee 2019 - Grand Tasting Impressions

Some quick notes after the Grand Tasting. Hope others will add their thoughts as well.

Overall, the 2016 vintage is a good one although the wines are a little more closed than what I sampled late last year as my purchases came in.

Best wines of the tasting for me were Liger Belair Clos du Chateau, Mugneret Gibourg Ruchottes, Hudelot Noellat Clos Vougeot, and Hubert Lignier Clos de la Roche. All hit notes of balance or uniqueness that were satisfying.

Highlight of the tasting was meeting Thibaud Clerget. A humble, approachable winemaker who seems to be on the way to greatness. His wines were very enjoyable.

Find of the tasting was Domaine Didier Fornerol. Whole cluster NSG wines that I’m told are reasonably priced. A but Jouan-like on the nose.

I did not taste as many whites but Leflaive was in fine shape. And re-confirmed that I just don’t connect with Jobard’s wines.

Also a nice surprise to have Delamotte/Salon present this year. Glad I bought some of the 2008 Delamotte BdB. It was very good. Of course so was the ‘07 Salon but not earth shattering like 96, 02, etc.

My one disappointment this year was the presence of a couple gentlemen who for some unknown reason thought it was a good idea to wear copious amounts of cologne. And just to be sure we could all smell them, must have reapplied in the men’s room during the event. It was that strong. Had to go smell coffee to clear my nose at one point.

All in all, it was a very good event, with lots of good food all around the room. I may have eaten as much as I drank this year. LOL.

Interested to hear what others thought.

Thanks for the notes Eric. Sounds like the usual suspects made great wines. I love Thibaud Clerget (Y Clerget) wines. I think they are going from strength to strength. A big plus is that it is Volnay!

Here is my short cut guide to the 2019 La Paulee Grand Tasting:

Knowing it would be impossible to hit everything, I had a plan and executed it, with Greg Kahn as my unexpected partner for most it and Sh@n A (who I met just before the doors opened) for many of the reds. Most producers tables had 4 wines. I tasted 99 wines in just over 3 hours but was still able to have nice chats with the winemakers or other domaine reps.

Given each of the wines I liked deserved its own meal and patience, not this quick fire tasting, I’m just going to provide a hit list of the highlights in the order tasted, 2016 unless noted, with one, two, or three stars for the best wines in my view. I did not list wines that didn’t do much for me.

I had tasted a few 2016s but was glad to get this snapshot of the vintage. Overall I thought 2016 was a fairly transparent early drinking vintage for whites with a hint of sweetness and sweet perfume but the best showing strong mineral notes and spice with deceptive structure, maybe like a more concentrated 2000. If premox doesn’t rear its head, these will age well, shedding baby fat along the way. Many of the reds are drinking pretty well, not as transparently pure as 2014 or as sized and dense as 2015 but the best will shine with time and many are even drinking well now (but I’d expect them to shut down).

If pushed, for this sampling of producers and wines, I was more impressed with the whites than the reds overall. Whereas there were strong whites at all levels, for the reds the Premier and Grand Crus were a clear step up.

Liger-Belair:
*Vosne Romanee Aux Reignots
**Echezeaux

Mugneret-Gibourg:
*Vosne Romanee
**Ruchottes
**(
)Clos Vougeot

Henri Gouges:
*Clos des Porrets
Pruliers
()Vaucrains
**(
)Les Saint Georges

Hudelot-Noellat:
(*)Clos Vougeot
()Romanee-Saint-Vivant

Y. Clerget:
**Volnay Caillerets
Clos Vougeot

(Note it was tough to try Hudelot-Noellat and Clerget Clos Vougeot after Mugneret-Gibourg.)

Leflaive:
Puligny Montrachet
(*)Puligny Montrachet Claivoillon
()Puligny Montrachet Pucelles

Antoine and Charlotte Jobard:
*Meursault Poruzots
**Meursault Genevrieres
**(
)Meursault Charmes

Vincent Girardin:
Meursault Genevrieres
Meursault Charmes
*Meursault Perrieres

Bernard Moreau:
Saint-Aubin En Remilly
*Chassagne Montrachet (a lot of 1er Cru in 2016, wines that couldn’t be made on their own, due to frost and thus extremely low yields)
*Chassagne Maltroie

Heitz-Lochardet:
Meursault Perrieres
*Pommard Rugiens

Bachelet-Monnot:
Puligny Montrachet Referts
Puligny Montrachet Folatieres

Marc Morey:
Chassagne Montrachet
()Chassagne Montrachet Morgeot
**(*)Chassagne Montrachet En Virondot
***Puligny Montrachet Pucelles

Blind Tasting with Pascaline Lepeltier:
*2015 Dauvissat Chablis Sechets (very yellow color; guessed Chassagne Premier Cru from a more linear, mineral site)
**2015 Meursault Charmes (I will get the producer - blanking right now; guessed Corton Charlemagne or BBM - had Grand Cru weight)
*2015 Bize Savigny-Les-Beaune Serpentieres (guessed 2015 Côte de Beaune)
*2005 Cathiard Vosne (guessed Chambolle or Morey Premier Cru with a bit of age)

H. Lignier:
*Morey-Saint-Denis 1er Cru Vielle Vignes
*Morey-Saint-Denis Chaffots
***Clos de la Roche

Benjamin Leroux:
Meursault Genevrieres Dessous
**Mazoyeres-Chambertin

Commune de Meursault Table - we had the great luck to try the 17 wines at this table side-by-side with Dominique Lafon for about 20 minutes, during which he showed me where various parcels of the wines we were trying were located on his Burgundy map app:
Henri Germain Meursault
Fichet Meursault Tesson
**Pierre Morey Meursault Tessons
Darnat Meursault Richemont
Mikulski Meursault Poruzots
**Genot-Boulanger Meursault Boucheres
Michel Bouzereau Meursault Charmes
Xavier Monnot Meursault Charmes
**(
)Latour-Giraud Meursault Genevrieres
**(*)Remi Jobard Meursault Genevrieres

Drouhin:
**(*)Beaune Clos des Mouches (Blanc)
*Chassagne Morgeot Marquis de Laguiche
Beaune Clos des Mouches (Rouge)
**(
)Chambertin Clos de Beze

Comtes Lafon:
Meursault Charmes

Dominique Lafon:
Beaune Vignes Franches

Henri Boillot:
Meursault Genevrieres
(I wasn’t impressed by the Puligny Clos de la Mouchere, Corton Charlemagne, or Volnay Caillerets - Clerget’s Caillerets was more charming and had better depth and structure)

William Fevre:
()Chablis Bougros Bouguerots
(*)Chablis Clos

Christian Moreau:
*2012 Clos “Clos des Hospices”
()2014 Clos “Clos des Hospices

Lamy-Pillot:
Chassagne “Pot Bois”
*Chassagne Morgeot
Chassagne Boudriotte (Rouge)

I missed the following from my plan because the Blind Tasting was unexpected and took about 20 minutes:

Bouchard Corton Charlemagne
Nicolas Rossignol’s table

Jayson, what is your ratings code? I will post my notes later, but generally agreed with nearly all your outperformers (on reds). However, it sounds like I’m a bigger fan of this vintage than you!

I’m still collating all my notes, will likely take a few days. La Paulee events, while crowded, remain my favorite big walk around tastings of the year. The food this year was great and readily available in small bites, allowing me to intermix food and drink and keep my palate perky. For the wines, I had a slightly different impression overall - in general I found the reds much stronger than the whites. The reds were very strong, with a lot of consistency.

For Pinot Noir, I view this is a fairly classic vintage, with less sweet rich fruit than 2015, but with (a lot!) more structure. I could see people preferring 2015 or 2016 based on individual taste. The Bourgogne and Village wines could be fairly early drinking but the higher tier wines will take some time to unfold unless you really like tannins. My standouts were similar to others’ to no surprise. Grand Crus from Liger-Belair, Mugneret Gibourg, Hudelot Noellat were wows but their primer crus were very consistent and worth cellaring. Clerget, Gouge and Rossignol were great. I liked H. Boillot’s Volnay.

The whites were, for me, a very mixed bag. Drouhin and H. Boillot were very good. I didn’t find many others that I deeply loved. I started the day with a seminar featuring 2017 Chassagnes (Lamy-Pillot and Bernard Moreau) that were consistent and much more interesting than almost anything from 2016. Btw I went to the Off the Grid event earlier in the week and found quite a few producers I hadn’t encountered before that were worth seeking in the future, mostly from Chablis (Beru, Oudin, Goisot, Cantin) but these were mostly 2015s (with a smattering of other vintages).

I’ll post a mammoth detailed list later in the week with a lot more detail.

As usual, I had a great time at the Grand Tasting yesterday. I liked the 2016 vintage. Certainly, not as opulent and showy as the 2015s I have had, it seemed like a very well balance vintage that should age quite well. Overall, there were just a tremendous amount of excellent wines at the tasting, both red and white.

Not unusually for me, my favorite producers of red wines were from Hudelot-Noellat and Mugneret-Gibourg. Mugneret-Gibourg is just one of the treasures of Burgundy these days and it is highly unfortunate to me that the prices have gotten so high in the US.

By contrast, given the quality, I think the HN wines are tremendous values in today’s market. And, all four of the wines tasted were outstanding. Interestingly, I thought the Clos Vougeot (which was just outstanding) and the village Vosne Romanee (best villages level wine in the room) were really open and expressive while the Vougeot Petite Vougeots and the fabulous Romanee St. Vivant were both more closed when I tasted them. Just a great performance.

My favorite whites overall were from (1) Bernard Moreau (friends and I argued whether the St. Aubin En Remilly or the village CM was the best of their less expensive wines (I went with the St. Aubin)) but we all agreed that all four of these wines were fantastic and I esp. liked the Morgeot (also a favorite in other vintages) and (2) from Leflaive (esp. the PM Clavoillon and the PM Pucelles). IMHO, looking at QPR, the Clavoillon generally is the go to wine in the Leflaive portfolio and it did not at all disappoint yesterday.

One of the things that excited me about yesterday was the number of up and coming estates in Burgundy that were presenting wines and some of my favorites were outstanding. I loved the wines of Clerget. They almost seemed to be made in a style somewhat like Hudelot-Noellat (obviously with different terroir), which to me is very high praise indeed. I think I liked the Clos du Verseuil more than a lot of you did. I found it (which was more elegant) and the Caillerets (which was more powerful) to be more on par with each other. The Clos Vougeot was the star of the table - it was an excellent afternoon for Clos Vougeot. How fun would it be to do a comparison in 15 years of the 2016 Clos Vougeots from Clerget, Hudelot-Noellat and Mugneret-Gibourg?

Heitz-Lochardet was another standout performer of the young guns. I esp. liked his Meursault Perrieres and his Pommard Rugiens. Meursault Perrieres is one of my favorite whites in Burgundy, so it is not that surprising that I really liked this one, but I generally am not a huge Pommard fan (at least in comparison with other Burgundy villages) and this held true last year when I visited Heitz and preferred his Volnays to his Pommards. But yesterday, I was really surprised at how good the Rugiens was. It was my favorite of the Pommards I had yesterday and made an excellent case for those wanting to promote Rugiens to Grand Cru.

A third young producer whose wines I very much enjoyed yesterday was Maison MC Thiriet. As I understand it, she is just getting started. She was showing 2017s and this was, I think she said, only her second vintage. And, the appellations tasted were all regional wine. But the wines tasted (both white and red) were really good and I esp. enjoyed her Cote de Nuits Villages Aux Montagnes.

There were a number of other standouts to me. I thought both Bouchard and Drouhin wines were standout. I very much liked the Bouchard Corton Charlemagne (one of the standout whites of the day) and their Volnay Caillerets. At Drouhin, I really liked the CM Morgeot (I have also really been enjoying the 2014 of this wine) and I thought their Clos de Beze may have been the best wine I tasted all day. Really, really long and elegant, this wine has a great future to it. Among other larger producers, I did not find the wines from Jadot to be as good as the wines from Bouchard and Drouhin. And, I was not that crazy about the wines from Boillot. They were good but did not really send me. On the other hand, I really enjoyed Bichot’s Echezeaux from the Domaine Clos Frantin. A number of my earliest Burgundies were from the Domaine Clos Frantin and I must admit that I got very nostalgic thinking about drinking these wines. I even discussed with Alberic Bichot my history drinking these wines in the 70s and early 80s with my father. One of my more enjoyable moments of the tasting and one that was almost unrelated to the wine.

I thought the wines of Hubert Lignier were also standouts. I especially enjoyed the MSD Chaffots, although I am sure their Clos de la Roche will be great over time (seemed a bit closed yesterday).

Another real treat was drinking two slightly older wines from Christian Moreau - 2012 and 2014 Chablis les Clos “Clos des Hospices”, which were two of my favorite whites of the day.

I liked the wines from Domaine Benjamin Leroux. I have not had their wines previously and I thought they were good, esp. the Mazoyieres Chambertin.

And, finally (although these were my first wines of the day), it was a real treat drinking Champagnes from Delamotte and Salon. The 2007 Salon was of course great, but the 2008 Delamotte was also a real star.

We could probably compare / contrast for hours and discuss why. Interesting areas of agreement and difference.

I gave M-G Ruchottes and Lignier CdlR three stars because they were surprisingly open and undeniably excellent. When we had the Lignier CdlR, it was singing. I think it was the only wine for which I asked for seconds.

I agree with Howard on Drouhin Beze. I had that after all of the other big gun reds and it was probably the most “serious” wine I tried, the one of all I would say needs plenty of time to show its depth. The most old school to put it another way. Great great potential. And Beaune Mouches next to it was no slouch.

Getting to Christian Moreau as the organizers were literally ripping bottles away from his table to start setting up for the dinner, the interesting difference between the 2014 Clos especially and almost all of the 2016 whites was the extract / phenolic intensity of the 2014 (not to mention it was Clos).

My best conversation other than with Dominique Lafon was at the end of the day with Daniel Cady-Lamy, the commercial director at Lamy-Pillot run by his wife and his wife’s sister. With the event over we got to shoot the breeze for 10 minutes. Great friendly guy.

Also very nice chatting with Marie-Christine Mugneret, Thibauld Clerget, Charles van Canneyt, Bernard Moreau, Eric Germain, Sabine Moillard, and more briefly Charlotte Jobard, Veronique Drouhin, and Guillaume Boillot. We were very lucky to have all of these folks in one room.

Yes. But, even if each of us went back today to taste the same wines all over again, we would not all have the same favorites. We are drinking 50-100 wines, spitting in many cases, have pours of 1 ounce or less, from different bottles and from bottles that have been opened for different amounts of time.

Having gone to this for now my 7th time, I find that my impressions of producers is more reliable to me (esp. over multiple events) and of the vintage generally are more reliable than are my impressions of any one or two wines. And, I am sure that my impressions of producers and of the vintage are more reliable to me than they are to anyone else as they are based on my taste preferences.

So, I hope the comparing and contrasting has some value to others who were not there. And, I find that over time reading about producers I may have skipped helps me determine whether I should make it a point to taste there next time.

Yes. Agree. That’s why I consider these just relative flash impresssions. I don’t score wines generally - and here these are just flash impressions on tiny pours.

Clerget worked at noellat for a bit before starting back up the family winery.

If anyone had conversations with producers about the contrast between 16 and 17, especially reds, I’d be very interested in hearing the general comments.

Not an answer to your question about 2017s, but Bichot did take the view he was very excited to see 2018s (reds) because he think they will surprise folks. He didn’t quite say it would be as good as 2016, but he wasn’t absolutely ruling it out.

I talked to Thomas Dinel from Marchand Tawse about them and he said that 17 was a very high quality vintage in his opinion with drastically higher yields compared to 16 but no significant drop off in quality.

Thanks. I knew that (I think he also worked at Domaine Drouhin in Oregon) and should have mentioned that when I noted the bit of similarity in style.

Yes. I have no idea how anyone could give scores to the wines we had yesterday afternoon.

Agreed, though in general I have a rough time with scoring. For a session like yesterday’s, I roughly have just a few gradations - odd/weak, ok, good, very good, omgwow. And Howard I agree with your notion that this is most valuable for producer/vintage assessment. Sadly most of my omgwows are out of my price range (e.g. Drouhin Clos de Beze and Hudelot Noellat RSV).

Probably my go to list of wines from yesterday for $100 or less would include:

Hudelot-Noellat - Vosne Romanee and Vougeot Petite Vougeot
Christian Moreau - Chablis les Clos
Heitz-Lochardet - Meursault Perrieres
Bernard Moreau - all of his wines
Bouchard - Volnay Caillerets
Clerget - Volnay Clos du Verseuil and Caillerets (if it still is under $100)
Drouhin - CM Morgeots

Goisot has had a long track record of making good long-lived wines with (so far) great QPR. I think they are in St. Bris or thereabouts outside Chablis proper.

Have seen some hype on Beru and have been interested in trying. Will keep a look out.

On 2016 versus 2017, I’m curious to see. I do think it was good to drink 2016 on its own, esp. in white, because although I enjoyed them more than you did apparently, they could be lost in comparison to bigger vintages. Bernard Moreau said picking date per parcel in 2016 was critical because with very low fruit per vine and small berries, the sugar-acid balance changed very rapidly at harvest time. He said it took a lot of vigilance at harvest to get this right.

Howard, to put your list in context, which growers didn’t you taste? And did you taste at the Commune de Meursault table?

Not Howard, but I unfortunately didn’t try the Commune de Meursault table until the very end when they started closing up bottles and then was only able to run through a handful as they were being closed. Seemed like good stuff for their price point.