Wines from a small gathering (7 people) for a shinen-kai (celebratory gathering after the New Year):
1979 Henriot: really delicious, lots of apple pie with balancing effervescence and acid, not upwardly mobile but well stored bottles should have plenty of life left.
2002 Coche Puligny: sadly corked (even with the cork taint, you could tell there was real beauty in the wine).
2000 Coche Puligny: classically Coche flint and smoke, light and yet seemingly endless on the palate, very nice.
2004 Bouchard Corton Charlemagne: still quite stubbornly backward and young, almost surly acidity but after being open for 3 hours, it started to provide some real pleasure with zesty citrus and lingering minerality.
1985 Rayas: My last 85 Rayas, bought on release and still a touch young, lightly tannic but soaring nose, kirsch, strawberry and a whisp of something mysterious and smoky.
1962 Latour: Still good, but on a gentle decline compared to prior bottles from the same case, iron, leather, touch of VA.
2002 DRC RSV: Strange showing as this bottle seemed really closed and surly, as opposed to other recent 02 burgs (Arnoux Suchots and RSV, Mugnier and Drouhin Musigny and Truchot Sorbes) and never really budged. This particular bottle was a grey market purchase from an importer I don’t particularly like, so there’s part of me that wonders if the bottle might have been mistreated a bit in the importation process (other bottles from the official importer have been nice albeit young).
Good weather for an evening in.