Yes. Stony/minerally nose at first followed by a big bouquet of fruit, flowers, and spices. Resemblance to a hypothetical blend of riesling and pinot blanc. Never would I have guessed chardonnay served blind. So much fruit intensity on the palate at the opening it seems sweet yet there’s plenty of backbone/acid on the finish. The most dry riesling-like chardonnay I can recall. Quite a bit different from the 2019 and 2020. I like eccentricity of the wine in those vintages but this is even more far out. If you are a regular white Burgundy consumer buy this if you are adventurous. Edit: The aromatic intensity of this wine is just stunning, just great, but I just can’t get my mind wrapped around that being chardonnay. This is a wine to have with sausages and choucroute, not oysters, if you follow.
Thank you @Steve_Costigan , I strongly recommend trying this wine over several days (even weeks) after opening (I just use a glass cork and keep the bottle standing in the fridge). The first blind tasting of the first vintage (2017) with a couple of friends, some thought it was Sauvignon blanc! It does get more Chardonnay-y after a bit of opening/ageing.
While I’m at it, we are in the midst of 2024 harvest. While most of our neighbors are done, we did what we usually do in this kind of vintage, we waited. We picked our sparkling block September 21th, and did our first picking of Quintaine Yesterday (25th). Today we’re taking 40mm of rain so we will probably start over on the 29th, time for everything to dry up a bit.
I’m sure you’ve heard it from other sources but 2024 have been a very tricky vintage, here we had 6 days of rain a week for 3 months (mid-april to mid-july), hence a very aggressive downy mildew and “millerandage” (small berries from incomplete fertilization due to cold/rain during flowering). Thus, we are picking small yields and many didn’t have the courage to wait for full maturity given the risk of additional losses with the forecasted rain.
The Burgundy “production guidelines” have already been changed 6 times this year to accommodate for lower sugar contents in berries (down to 11% minimum for many Grand Cru, 10.5% for 1er and 10.2% for villages) and up the maximum sugar addition (to 2% in many appellations). This is a clear call to know who you’re going to buy from in this vintage as we are currently picking at 13.2% potential (and never had any intention to had sugar as we never did in our 40 vintages), and we’re not the only one. I’m sure they’ll be some marvelous wines in this difficult vintage if you know where to look.
I’m including a picture from yesterday’s harvest, “millerands” from a block that is not usually subject to that. You’ll see a bit of noble rot (purple grapes), but not that much on the millerands as the sall berries are less prone to it (higher skin to pulp ratio and looser bunches that provide more ventilation). Some other bunches are 100% noble rot but I’d say for now we are at 5-10%, wouldn’t be surprised if we reach 20% by the end of harvest.
Thank you all for following this thread!
Great picture and vintage info, thank you! I’m really curious about the noble rot. 20% is a lot! Do you ever consider vinifying those grapes into a sweet Chardonnay? Uneconomical but an interesting experiment.
Hello and thank you for the question!
Yes, we did it for 4 vintages in the 90’s: 91, 92, 96 and 99, under the name “grains cendrés”, 100-150g residual noble rot Chardonnay. We still have around a dozen bottles here and they taste great.
We don’t plan on doing it again for 2 reasons:
1/ Even-though I love them, the market for sweet wines have crashed. Our colleagues in Layon or other sweet-wines producing regions are struggling to sell amazing and decently priced sweet wines and are driven toward dry whites. (take a look at the price of old Sauternes, Layon, etc. at auction… it’s stupid)
2/It’s a hassle: a month after harvest is done, you have to find a team, dirty your press again (1 full day of cleaning for a team of 2, we’re kind of nitpickers), you’ll lose big on the initial harvest, if you harvest anything at all. In 1999, my parents in law were planning to pick some noble rot grapes on January 1st 00am for the new millennium. The birds took care of it.
So, nowadays a lot of trouble and losing potential wine for something that you’ll have trouble finding a market for. It made much more sense back then when we had a market and younger vines (higher yield), it would definitely make sense for someone who’s yield would exceed the legal maximum otherwise.
Since 2018 we have the right to produce Viré-Clessé “demi-sec” (4-8g residual) and “levrouté” (8-18g residual), but I don’t support that as, at this level of residual, I feel the wine is more “heavy” than decisively “sweet” and it might just confuse consumers about Viré-Clessé the same way many are confused about Alsace.
I can’t find it in their current range but I know Pegasus Bay in NZ did some noble rot Chardonnay around 2010.
Yes, very much so. The same bottle tasted on a subsequent day revealed more chardonnay, dry but very concentrated. I can’t say I’ve ever had a later harvest chardonnay before but I would imagine one made in a dry style it might be similar to this. I really love this wine. Thank you for your terrific wines!
2024 Harvest is done, and I’m happy it is! We finished Sunday October 6th, just in time before we got hit by hurricane Kirk’s tail (80+mm of rain followed by 100km/h of wind from Monday evening). Overall very happy with what we got both in terms of quality and quantity considering the vintage. We should have something resembling 2021 on our hands, a great tasting vintage by my account. And if I’m right, it should be a great vintage to drink while patiently waiting for the 23’s (same thing we did with the 20/21).
I told you I’d come back to show some noble rot, so here it is:
And if you wonder why 2024 will be a scarce vintage in Burgundy keep in mind that 2024 is a lot of such bunches:
ONE surviving berry (no its not a berry I attached myself, its from this bunch) from downy mildew on what could have been a nice bunch. Of course this is an extreme example but 20-80% damage is not uncommon.
Also some very nice stuff while I’m at it, from our “Retour à la Terre” block, aged in terracota amphoras, always super healthy, despite being on a clay pocket and spending basically the vintage as a puddle:
Merci for that information. I can hardly wait to try the 2024s!
Hello all,
this is a “save the date” announcement
A Renaissance des Appellations (“Return to Terroir”) tasting will take place with around 60 estates in NYC, April 23rd Metropolitan Pavilion 125 W. 18 Street 11am-5pm
The tasting is trade and press only. If you can come, I strongly recommend this tasting. I don’t have the final list of attendees yet but I’ll keep you posted and you can check the member list of Renaissance on the website here, that should trigger some drooling .
I’ll be there and happy to meet berserkers.
Also happy to meet and share a glass of wine or bourbon with anyone in NYC, and probably Boston and Washington as I should stop by there too.
Best,
Gautier