During the past 2 years I’ve had the privilege to drink two top-tier red Burgundies with about a decade of bottle age: 2010 Rousseau Chambertin and 2009 DRC La Tache. I found both to be, like, pretty good…but super disappointing relative to my sky-high expectations, and also relative to red Burgs of ever so slightly lesser pedigree I’ve drank at a younger age (for example, 2010 Hudelot Noellat Romanee St. Vivant tasted in 2014 and 2016 Rousseau Clos St. Jacques tasted in 2019 both knocked my socks off). Did I just make a rookie mistake by opening these wines at an age at which they were very likely to be shut down? And if red Burgs really do have a U-shaped aging curve, how long does the “baby fat” window last for best-of-the-best, 4-digit-priced wines, and if you miss it, how many years do you have to wait before there’s a good chance they’re starting to wake up from their slumber?
2010 Domaine Armand Rousseau Père et Fils Chambertin- France, Burgundy, Côte de Nuits, Chambertin Grand Cru (3/3/2019)
Translucent, nearly transparent ruby. Potent nose of opulent, vanilla/coconut oak; nutmeg; coffee bean; dried flowers; ripe, sweet cherries; and some vegetal, celery-like notes (stem inclusion?). Really dense, concentrated, and powerful on the palate—packs a wallop despite quite modest extraction. Vibrant acid, really well-disguised tannin, and outstanding length. Nonetheless, this is probably showing more future potential than outright deliciousness on the palate at this point. Would love to check back in 10-15 years, not that I’ll ever be able to afford this again. (92 pts.)
2009 Domaine de la Romanée-Conti La Tâche- France, Burgundy, Côte de Nuits, La Tâche Grand Cru (12/6/2020)
Translucent dark ruby. Ripe, dark, concentrated, reticent, brooding. Black cherry, lots of stemmy character, a hint of violets, somewhat muted. Plenty of structure, depth, and length, but this is pretty monolithic at this stage. The only hint of the pedigree here is the power and polish. I presume this will be great one day, but I wouldn’t recommend it for current drinking.
I could be wrong, but for the most of them, my understanding was that time is what separates Grand Cru from 1er. Given the pre-mox problems I think the only GC’s that I’d be opening would be whites or reds that I had more than 6 bottles of. It’s a shame that you had these icons and they under-performed.
2010 Rousseau is very shut down in general, all the way down to the village level - it got damn near unpleasant to drink after a few hours in a decanter a few months ago. I think this is unique to Rousseau though; a 2010 Ponsot Clos de la Roche was beautiful in January, and may be the best Ponsot I’ve ever had.
I can’t recall a shut down 2009 I’ve had recently, but I haven’t had 2009 DRC, so YMMV.
Kevin shin had mentioned that he thought the 09 DRCs needed time. I generally love 09/10 grand cru but wouldn’t be opening drc or Rousseau right now. 07 drc are fantastic and Kevin had mentioned he loved the 08 rsv although I haven’t had it lately.
I have found the babyfat window to be almost nonexistent on GC from structured vintages, Chambertin especially can remain sullen for a long long time.
20 years ago (When you could usually taste wines before ordering) I would grab a bunch of half bottles of Grand and premier cru Burgs that I was interested in and head off to Balzac (restaurant in Sydney) and open them all and make notes and decide what to buy, TBH a lot of the time the young GCs were akin to gargling nuts and bolts.
I’ve loved 2010s but had a 2010 Simon Bize Aux Guettes on Thanksgiving that definitely did not show its pedigree. It wasn’t completely closed or bad at all, just kind shy and not as expressive as I’d expect. Definitely going to give the 10s some time.
I last drank the 2009 La Tâche, off a restaurant list in Beaune, in summer 2019, and it was very dramatic and expressive! To the extent that, if I had a few bottles, I might be tempted to open another one sooner than would be prudent. I’m sorry to hear yours wasn’t open for inspection, Dan!
I think if you’re, like me, only able to buy singles of the ‘elite’ Burgundies the best policy is to wait till they’re 20-25+ years old to improve your chances of success. Anything else is just too risky given limited resources
But the same '02’s have just been consistently delicious almost their entire lives. Been lucky enough to sample several over the past 15 years. Still have 2 of each '01 & '02. Couldn’t find them in our market after that. Will try to hold off on these for a while.
Robert Pavlovich opened a 2010 Rousseau Clos st Jacques earlier this year that was SINGING. Easily one of the best wines I had this year.
Also a 2010 Rousseau Gevrey Chambertin was pretty killer too in August as a pop and pour - also had a 2010 DRC Corton that night that was delicious. 2010 DRC GE in Jan was stunning too (served blind).
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