Had the opportunity to taste a few Musigny the other night, which reminded me of a problem that I have with Musigny. My problem is that (although I really haven’t had that many), Musigny (along with Amoureuses) is one of my favorite red burgs. This actually raises several problems, one being that I don’t have any, and another being that I regard it as too expensive to justify buying. The primary problem, though, is that I have such high expectations and a mental construct of what I am expecting, that I can often end up vaguely disappointed by a wine in front of me that in reality is actually quite impressive. This is actually a problem I have with most Grand Cru burg, and is why I primarily buy PC and on down the line, but that is another discussion. Another problem (how can there be so many problems with a favorite wine?) is that a large chunk of the Musigny out there comes from one producer, Vogue, who in my opinion had some stylistic problems in the 90’s.
Anyway, we tasted some very nice wines as follows:
2007 Meursault Boisson-Vadot les Grands Charrons–Still young penetrating Meursault with a creosote character a little reminiscent of Coche.
1996 Leflaive Chevalier-Montrachet–a monster, powerful wine still feeling young with years to go. thank god it was a healthy bottle. Could have been the wine of the night.
1969 Remoissenet Santenay-Gravieres–Still an incredible bottle–aged red berry fruit, slightly smoky underbrush, and an intriguing saline/caramel component that makes it delicious.
1993 Lafarge Volnay clos des Chateau des Ducs–Whole spectrum of dark cherry to red cherry fruit. Very faint corked character for 2 out of the 5 of us, but still came across pretty well.
1999 Drouhin les Amoureuses–Pretty, feminine, somewhat sexy red fruits but unfortunately also somewhat oxidized. Cork was perfect. wine was acquired thru normal retail channels in Seattle.
1996 Vogue Bonnes-Mares–Earthy, muscular, but not hard wine. Dark cherry fruit, mineral and a little vegetal spice. Still seems a bit young.
2001 Vogue Musigny–Bright feminine red fruit, a little herbal complexity which adds to the package rather than detracting. A really engaging wine, and the most enjoyable at the moment amongst the Vogues.
1993 Vogue Musigny–firm, dark wine, more density than I expected. Darker fruit, somewhat restrained. Seems over-extracted. and seems too early to enjoy.
1993 J-F Mugnier Musigny–very pretty/sexy darker red fruits with prominent spice. In a great space and a crowd pleaser. My only quibble was that it seemed a bit short and a little insubstantial on the palate in comparison to most of the other grand crus of the evening. But hard to complain much about this wine.
Overall, a great and instructive tasting. Would I spend $1000 on a Musigny? Hmmm.