Hopefully that is the only time I say Manning in a positive way for the next 72 hours.
2006 Henri Gouges Nuits St. Georges Les St. Georges: Look I know this is way too early and I was perhaps taking my life and my dining companions’ lives less seriously than I should be. I have lots of Gouges and I am well aware of what young Gouges can do to the insides of your mouth. I got a deal on a bunch of '06 awhile back and I have found it to be quite the vintage for normally rough and tumble wines to be much showier than normal at a youthful age. The 2006 Clos de la Bussiere for instance is breathtakingly marvelous right now while the 2001 (at last check) remained quite clenched. This is the best young Gouges I have ever had and it can be drunk without fear of tannin-overload right now (hell, I had it with trout–and on an aside the trout and most of the food in general at relatively new The Woodsman Tavern in SE Portland was marvelous and their wine list is quite good especially if you have a hankering for some Cameron wines). The aromatics are the darker Nuits style of fruit all tussled up with smoked meat, iron shavings, coffee grounds and loam. Really smells quite delicious and accessible. Dense, powerful and slightly brooding yet relatively expansive mid-palate. Lots of weight as the wine pulls through. Ripe blackberry, plum tart, braised beef, lead and beef bouillon make for a complex and interesting flavor profile. Tannins come on in the end but they are rich and complementary of the overall density and intensity of the wine. They attract the flavors and pull them to the tongue making for a long and rich finish. While this will be a terrific and more complete wine in 10 years there is no harm in letting one fly here. This was a treat to drink especially since all that Gouges does is sit there in the cellar doing nothing. Was nice to trot one out and take it around the block. Think I’ll take a look at the Prulieres coming up here in the near future!
2008 Domaine Anne Gros & Jean-Paul Tollot Minervois Les Fontanilles: Went off the Burg thing here but kept it in check by getting Rhone wine from a Burg producer(s). Been interested to taste this and we had stuff like smoked lentils and ham (really freaking good ham BTW) and whatnot coming for apps. Inky dark color. This is very intense and pretty good. It’s a little sweet in the mid-palate for my tastes but when I go off of Pinot I tend to like the drier character of Northern Italian wines more than the sweeter huckleberry and mocha flavors that are here. Fortunately it is neither oaky nor so sappily ripe that it carries the sweetness all the way through to the finish. I can see this being pretty popular.
Good on ya, Jim. I felt like I was manning up to broach a 1990 NSG Vaucrains from Bertrand Ambroise recently at over 20 years of age. That wine still kicked my @$$ six ways to Sunday. Glad the young Gouges was tamed better.
This wine was delicious and totally drinkable last night. Don’t know that I would have pegged it as Gouges blind. Pretty distinctly a high quality Nuits but this was no monolith at all. This was smoking. If you couldn’t get pleasure from the bottle we drank last night you simply don’t like either young Burgundy at all or Nuits.
I bought a few bottles of 07 Gouges LSG today. I couldn’t ignore the price. Im curious how those will turn out. I tried the 08 Clos des Porrets St. Georges not to long ago and it was elegant and beautiful with enough air.
I like the accessibility of 07 gouges. I had the LSG and the Pruliers and they were accessible. I think his wine making style lends well to lean vintages like 07. Try one out… especially at the price you got it for!
Thanks for the note Jim! Sounds like enjoyable stuff… I have a case each sitting here of the '08 and the '09 Gouges Les St. Georges that I’m wondering whether to at least give a shot at one of the bottles or if I should just relegate them to long term storage… your note tempts me to give one a shot.
And I haven’t been to Woodsman Tavern… may have to look into it. Thanks again,
What about the 07 Vaucrains? I had a eye on this one earlier to open and rembered how tight it was last time. Will that wine ever soften up or should I think about gifting to my son in law so he can drink it when he is 60?
Hey, I just returned from a 2001/2002 red burg tasting tonight, and one of the pairs was gouges Les St George. wines were double decanted 2 hrs before the tasting. both wines showed explosive ripe dark fruits on the nose, the 2002 with substantial anise and a little more ripeness. the palates were more restrained, and oddly a little flat (not sure if this was just being a bit closed in or from the hang-time of the fruit). They were both surprisingly approachable and enjoyable. Yes they need 10 plus years, but I didn’t feel at all bruised trying them.
no - I get much more pleasure out of Gouges than I ever got from Dunn - at least the Howell Mountain fruit. I used to be able to identify Howell Mountain fruit blind when I drank more Cabernet.
In the mid-nineties, we had the opportunity to drink multiple ex-cellar examples of Vaucrains, Pruliers, & LSG from the '50’s, '60’s and '70’s. Of course they sucked me in and I’ve been a buyer since the '99’s as a consequence. So, I’m really curious about Maureen’s response as to when they enter their drinking window - after 20+ years?