TN: 2017 Hudelot-Noellat Chambolle-Musigny

It should come as no surprise to anyone that this is just gorgeous. PnP and singing right from the first moment: enveloping, broad nose of intense (though never candied) red fruit, fresh herbs, intense trail of white pepper and beautiful chalkiness and granite. The acidity is extremely vibrant and volumous without ever being unapproachable or hard, with a seemingly endless end palate. A beauty which I can’t imagine ever not drinking well in its future development. Really glad I splurged on this wine and still have another five bottles left. Enormous step up from the linear Bourgogne, and why buy Premier Cru at four times the price?
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I agree that the Chambolle AC is tremendous and probably the best value in the line along with the Bourgogne.

I think the Chambolle charmes is only twice as much as the ac, and is definitely a step up. The more expensive premier cru are mostly from vosne which are very different wines.

And they age well, too!

I’ve currently lined-up my remaining 2002 for near term drinking. Drank the last 3 in the last 4 years and they all are in very good form.

No doubt. I imagine this will be a stunner in 10 years time.

How do you feel about the village Vosne compared to the Chambolle?

Great note - can’t wait to pop one.

Fwiw I had the Chambolle Charmes HN a month ago , and while it was a nice wine, quite fragrant and feminine, it failed to create real excitement (among the group as well as with me). Came out last in the flight with M.Gros Reas and Confuron CM 1er Cru. It was simply a bit one dimensional and felt “light”, lacking length.

Not to complain, but I’d rather buy the other two for less.

though I’m pretty happy with my Burg collection, were I to have a do over, I’d buy cases of AC and lieux dits wines instead of bottles of grand cru. They age tremendously and the disparity between them and grand cru diminishes a lot with age.

Sorry for my ignorance.
What do AC and lieux dits mean?

Thanks,

Lonnie

Four times the price? I paid $150 for the 2017 Clos Vougeot (a grand cru). The 2017 villages wines, which I agree are excellent wines and values, are $60-70.

Do you rate the Chambolle AC a better value than the Vosne Romanee AC?

AC is an abbreviation for appellation controlee. As used here, it refers I believe to wines only allowed a villages AC, as opposed to a higher AC.

Lieux dits is an individual vineyard site, as I understand it. Here I believe it refers to a wine only entitled to a villages AC but which come from one site in the villages, as opposed to a blend of wines from multiple sites within the AC.

Tend to agree with this although caveat that they need to be from the more ‘soleil’ vintages.

[scratch.gif]. When did we last have a vintage that wasn’t or are you just saying that climate change is making villages level wines better?

I generally like the Chambolle a bit more. I find the HN vosne 1er and grand cru of a bit more interest for me, especially suchots.

Villages wines in vintages like 2004 and 2011 really struggle. But ib general warmer vintages give cooler vineyards a leg up. Suspect greater demand, higher prices and improved production methods benefit the average quality of villages wines, without citing empirical data.

Had the '13 of this on the weekend. It was a little skinny through the mid-palate and needs a bit more time.

When it comes to the 2017 vintage at current retail prices in Europe, I got this village wine for 38€ and the Vosne premiers sell for around 155-160€ (Charmes, as Michael mentioned, is an exception). So yes, it is pretty much four times the price. I’m imagining it may have been different on release, or US pricing isn’t the same in the exact proportion.

Would love to have been offered the Clos Vougeot for that…

It was on the website at MacArthur Beverages in DC for a decent amount of time for that price. So, you could have purchased it.