Dujac/Ponsot CDLR dinner

14 lucky souls gathered in the private room at The Square last night for a quite splendid dinner. I had asked the question here and on the UK BB last year as to whether people preferred Dujac or Ponsot CDLR as I’d had a fair bit of experience (always very positive) with the latter but very little with the former. The Square did us proud with exemplary food and service. Indeed, the canape of beef tartare, shaved truffles and foie gras on crispbread was a highlight of the evening for me. With the other canapes we had a couple of lovely champagnes to kick things off:

1990 Billecart-Salmon Champagne Cuvée Nicolas-François Billecart - France, Champagne (1/27/2012)
Dark gold colour with tiny stream of bubles. Lovely, delicate, precise, darker fruits, pointed/dry finish. Very much enjoyed this.

1985 Charles Heidsieck Champagne Champagne Charlie Brut Oenotheque - France, Champagne (1/27/2012)
Amazingly young, clear, light yellow colour. Vigorous, refreshing and young on the palate. Lots of toasted white bread!

We then moved to the main event. With a quite splendid ravioli of quail with savoury onions, somerset snails, roasting juices and thyme we had:

1997 Domaine Ponsot Clos de la Roche Vieilles Vignes - France, Burgundy, Côte de Nuits, Clos de la Roche Grand Cru (1/27/2012)
High toned/acetone, red fruit nose and palate. Smooth mid-palate with tangy acidity holding it together. Began to fade and become a bit thinner with air but still good.

1997 Domaine Dujac Clos de la Roche - France, Burgundy, Côte de Nuits, Clos de la Roche Grand Cru (1/27/2012)
Much darker, richer and more powerful fruit profile than the ponsot. An odd, menthol finish meant it showed quite maturely.

2000 Domaine Ponsot Clos de la Roche Vieilles Vignes - France, Burgundy, Côte de Nuits, Clos de la Roche Grand Cru (1/27/2012)
Nice showing. Darker/richer fruit than the 95 and all in all a deeper wine.

2000 Domaine Dujac Clos de la Roche - France, Burgundy, Côte de Nuits, Clos de la Roche Grand Cru (1/27/2012)
Quite a lot of brett on the nose but gorgeous on the palate. Really excellent.


For the next 2x2 flight we had roast duck with a tarte fine of caramelised endive and turnip.

1995 Domaine Ponsot Clos de la Roche Vieilles Vignes - France, Burgundy, Côte de Nuits, Clos de la Roche Grand Cru (1/27/2012)
Slightly dilute, red fruited nose and palate. Palate was seamless though and quite lovely.

1995 Domaine Dujac Clos de la Roche - France, Burgundy, Côte de Nuits, Clos de la Roche Grand Cru (1/27/2012)
Somewhat stewed red fruit on the nose and palate. Not sure about this bottle.

1998 Domaine Ponsot Clos de la Roche Vieilles Vignes - France, Burgundy, Côte de Nuits, Clos de la Roche Grand Cru (1/27/2012)
Much darker colour and fruit profile than the 95, 97 and 2000 served earlier. Quite a meaty/gravy element but with a persistently very dry finish. Needs a lot of time.

1998 Domaine Dujac Clos de la Roche - France, Burgundy, Côte de Nuits, Clos de la Roche Grand Cru (1/27/2012)
Very powerful nose. At first, quite awkward and disjointed on the palate. Set aside for an hour. Really came together with time, offering vibrant red fruits on a seamless palate.


We threw in some different whites as a palate refreshing intermezzo…

2007 Ceritas Chardonnay Porter-Bass Vineyards - USA, California, Sonoma County, Russian River Valley (1/27/2012)
Lots of buffering fat/extract, buttery oak/vanilla and acid. All dials turned up to 11 but it doesn’t work at the moment.

2008 Pierre-Yves Colin-Morey Chassagne-Montrachet 1er Cru Les Caillerets - France, Burgundy, Côte de Beaune, Chassagne-Montrachet 1er Cru (1/27/2012)
Showed very young indeed. Green apples, matchstick/sulphur. Tight, dry finish.


Back to the main programme with a superbly rich risotto of calves tails with smoked tendons and chanterelles matching an equally superb flight of 5 wines…

1999 Domaine Ponsot Clos de la Roche Vieilles Vignes - France, Burgundy, Côte de Nuits, Clos de la Roche Grand Cru (1/27/2012)
Seriously big/imposing wine. Rich, black fruits with hints of roast coffee beans. Will be amazing in another 10-15 years.

1999 Domaine Dujac Clos de la Roche - France, Burgundy, Côte de Nuits, Clos de la Roche Grand Cru (1/27/2012)
Again, as with the 99 ponsot, such a big, meaty wine with fruits in the red and black spectrum. Needs a long time.

2001 Domaine Ponsot Clos de la Roche Vieilles Vignes - France, Burgundy, Côte de Nuits, Clos de la Roche Grand Cru (1/27/2012)
Surprise of the tasting. Very intense, bright, red cherry fruit. Really great showing and drinking so well now.

2002 Domaine Dujac Clos de la Roche - France, Burgundy, Côte de Nuits, Clos de la Roche Grand Cru (1/27/2012)
Monster wine! Amazingly intense, sweet, delicious fruit. Just so good already! Blew away the CSD at first but was much closer when the CSD came together. (

2002 Domaine Dujac Clos St. Denis - France, Burgundy, Côte de Nuits, Clos St. Denis Grand Cru (1/27/2012)
At first, quite stinky and sweaty on the nose but with clean, bright red fruits on the seamless palate. The brett faded with air and it became much purer/more noble in some ways. Really came on strong and pushed the CDLR hard in the end.


With the final flight of more mature dujacs we had roast woodcock with crushed root vegetables and liver croute

1989 Domaine Dujac Clos de la Roche - France, Burgundy, Côte de Nuits, Clos de la Roche Grand Cru (1/27/2012)
Gorgeous, sweet, smooth, persistent, elegant red fruit. So precise and poised with not a hair out of place. Could drink this all day!

1991 Domaine Dujac Clos de la Roche - France, Burgundy, Côte de Nuits, Clos de la Roche Grand Cru (1/27/2012)
Surprisingly mature showing. Lots of varnish on the nose and palate. This bottle retained plenty of nice underlying dark fruit but I couldn’t get past the varnish.
Posted from CellarTracker

Well done Dan. That 02 Dujac CdlR is almost impenetrable but one hell of a wine.
Best regards
Jeremy

Very nice notes from what sounds like a nice night too. Thanks Dan.

Thanks. Very nice notes.

Great idea for tasting and nice notes. I need to find more CdlR from these 2 producers. It’s just the price that keeps me away most of the time. But when I find a good deal for these wines (rare), I snatch up all I can get. Thanks for posting.

Great notes Dan. You know it’s a good day, when you have a dinner packed with Dujac and Ponsot!

Great notes. I can almost taste those wines.

Great read Dan and like the format (producer, vintage, vineyard comparison). Focused and well done . . .

Good stuff. Although I just had a heart attack after reading that.

Thanks for the notes, Dan, especially as I have a few of these wines tucked away. Sounds like an amazing evening. I’m going to copy these notes into my database for guidance on my bottles.

Dan,

Where’s the punch line/answer to the question that sparked the tasting?

I had asked the question here and on the UK BB last year as to whether people preferred Dujac or Ponsot CDLR as I’d had a fair bit of experience (always very positive) with the latter but very little with the former.

Larry

Thanks Dan,

Great notes and a very interesting tasting. You don’t often see such an impressive lineup of CDLR’s…

I’ve had every vintage of Ponsot since 93 except 94 and 04. If anyone is looking for a spectacular CDLR jump on the 08.

One of the few Ponsot CdlR I do have.

Thanks for the notes Dan. It sounds like a great night. I’m personally a fan of both. I have several vintages of each in my cellar look forward to having to suffer through the process of deciding which I prefer (when they are mature, of course).

Larry,

I would say that overall the dujacs were more consistent, powerful and perfumed and the ponsots a little more lean/precise but reflective of each vintage ie weaker vintage ponsots showed a lighter, perhaps even slightly dilute wine whereas “big” vintages like 1999 were very grandiose indeed. Hard to say which I preferred - the dujacs will more readily and consistently impress people I would expect, but the ponsots will certainly enchant drinkers and at the end of the day, all were drunk up…! I’d certainly grab any of the 01 ponsot you can find though because it’s an absolute steal at current prices.

Dan

In my limited experience, I think that the tendency is for the wines Chez Dujac to out perform in lesser vintages…

Many thanks for the notes on a fascinating tasting. I wish I was more familiar with Ponsot; most of experience for Clos de la Roche is with Dujac (a good problem to have!) I’ve never had the two producers side-by-side. Your notes don’t really mention oak, did you generally not notice it? Just curious because one producer is no new oak and the other, for CLDR 100% or close to new oak.

Again just curious, were the wines tasted single blind?

Thanks again for the excellent notes.

Two side notes. They were pouring the 2004 Dujac CDLR out of magnum today at the Acker auction in Chicago and it was showing very nice. I didn’t get any green and I’ve been pretty sensitive to it in the past. It was ready now by the way.

I haven’t had many older Dujac but a recent bottle of the 93 Ponsot CDLR was fantastic and one of the best burgs I’ve ever had.

Peter,

The wines were not served single blind. The only mention of the word “oak” all evening from anyone that I heard was re the Ceritas!

Dan