Domaine Faiveley buys historic Williams-Selyem

Dominique Laurent, and I admittedly have liked more of them than I expected over the years.

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One guy and one point in a list of typical Burgundian characteristics. That’s pretty nitpicky IMO.

I know Grivot destems entirely. I think Roumier does as well.

I’m sure it’s a pretty diverse landscape in terms of that practice.

That’s pretty insulting to refer to Jayer as “one guy”

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There is certainly a lot of diversity in terms of approach, and it keeps changing with each passing generation too.

If Henri was in his 30-40’s in 2025 I wonder what he would think as a winemaker in today’s climactic conditions.

I don’t think of using 100% new oak as unjudicious, I think judicious oak use is dictated by vintage and fruit harvested whether that be all neutral or all new or somewhere in between and what it can handle.

One really good winemaker. Better?

Anyway the point was Kris made a list of Burgundian characteristics and everyone has jumped on the one that was possibly a bit misguided and ignored the rest of his very valid post.

Everyone?

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I can mostly discuss what I like and don’t like but even this changes as a wine matures.

Brilliant neologism, well done. :clap:

A new term “neologism” not regularly refrenced in wine discussion.

I am not sure what to think of 100% new oak except it seems to depend.

My favorite Burgundy producer has long been Jacky Truchot. I went to tastings of his 2021s and 2022s (a year apart) in the early to mid-2000s and was struck by his Charmes Chambertin. Most of Truchot’s wines saw no new oak but he needed to buy some new oak every year to replace barrels. So, he put the Charmes Chambertin in the new oak (I think it was 100% new oak but not sure). When I went to these tastings when the wine was young, the Charmes really stood out from the other wines (including another Grand Cru, Clos de la Roche) because of the new oak. It did not taste like a typical Truchot wine. However, now, when I have tasted Charmes Chambertin from those or newby vintages with some of his other wines from the same time period (all 20+ years old), they taste very much like Truchot wines and I doubt I could pick out the wine just from the new oak. I don’t see where the new oak has an effect on the mature wines, either positive or negative.

So, there is a lot about the use of new oak that I don’t understand.

I have no problem with new oak. I’m using more these days. In 2024 I’ll have 2 wines that are 100% new oak and another that is 75% new barrel.

Curious which two are 100% new and are they site/block specific or what pointed you in this direction.

Notorious has always been 100% new barrel. The Weber Vineyard bottling will also be 100% new barrel this year. It’s a different direction for sure but I liked how the wines from there have been working with the set of barrels we have settled on since 2022. Hyland Vineyard will be 75% new barrel for the same reasons.

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Jim - I’m curious what sort of barrel has worked best when you’ve used a high proportion of new barrels.

We use a high percentage of Cadus barrels which are fairly low impact, next at about 15% of volume is Darnaud & Jaegle which are really amazing barrels and half of the ones we get are their upper tier barrel which is truly an amazing barrel. Then a little bit of Chassin, Francois Freres and Tonnellerie O.

I’ve always been confused about the new barrel question Jim. Are these all French / European oak wood, which I believe imparts less of that vanilla flavor than American oak?

By their names it sounds like it.

Even French oak imparts some vanilla when it is new- do I have that right?

Last question, I promise: :nerd_face: What does new oak exposure do for a well made long-aging wine that used oak does not?

BTW: The PG Notorious is great wine. I called an 05 version Morey St. Denis recently. So much for my blind tasting skills…

Pardon my ignorance but …. What is the trade off between time in new barrel versus percentage of new? 50% for 12 months versus 100% for six months.