WB Burgundy Appellation Series Week 8: Nuits-Saint-Georges

[Ray_Walker]

Hello and welcome to week 8 of our WineBerserkers Weekly Burgundy Appellation tasting series! This week, we are focusing on the wines of Nuits-Saint-Georges and it’s 41 1er Crus which include:

Aux Champs Perdrix
En la Perrière Noblot
Les Damodes
Aux Boudots
Aux Cras
La Richemone
Aux Murgers
Aux Vignerondes
Aux Chaignots
Aux Thorey
Aux Argillas
Aux Bousselots
Les Perrières
Les Hauts Pruliers
Château Gris
Les Crots
Rue de Chaux
Les Procès
Les Pruliers
Roncière
Les Saint-Georges
Les Cailles
Les Porrets Saint-Georges
Clos des Porrets Saint-Georges
Les Vallerots
Les Poulettes
Les Chaboeufs
Les Vaucrains
Chaînes Carteaux
Clos des Grandes Vignes
Clos de la Maréchale
Clos Arlot
Les Terres Blanches
Les Didiers
Clos des Forêts Saint-Georges
Aux Perdrix
Clos des Corvées
Clos des Corvées Pagets
Clos Saint-Marc
Les Argillières
Clos des Argillières

Cheers

Ray

[JT_Ng]

My favorites are Aux Cras and Aux Boudots. Clearly my preference leans towards Vosne.

[Claude_Kolm]

As Ray points out, there is an almost impossibly large number of premiers crus, which I think stops most people from ever trying to sort out what’s really going on in Nuits, and instead they concentrate on a couple of vineyards that they like. But it’s actually not difficult at all to understand as the vineyards break into organizable units. The first and most important cut is to divide the vineyards in three: those at the south in Prémeaux-Prissey, those in the heart (i.e., north of the vineyards of Prémeaux-Prissey) up to the river that slices the town of Nuits in two, and then northern portion on the slope shared with Vosne-Romanée.

Starting with the Clos de la Maréchale, I find the wines of Prémeaux-Prissey are lighter and more mineral and stony than the others, although as one moves north to the Clos des Forêts and Didiers, they begin to fill out and increasingly resemble the wines of the heart of Nuits. You really can sense the stone in the soil with these wines. One peculiarity is the premier cru Clos des Grandes Vignes which is east (downslope) from the route nationale, the only premier cru in Burgundy to have that dubious distinction.

The heart of Nuits is where one finds Les St-Georges, Vaucrains, Cailles, Porêts-St-Georges as well as less well-known but very vineyards such as Rue de Chaux, Chaboeufs, and les Procès. These are generally richer, more tannic wines, generally with dark fruit. Within this sector, there is quite a fascinating difference from one vineyard to another depending on soil and exposition. In particular, as one moves north, exposition changes from east to a more northerly direction and the vines are exposed to the winds that come down the valley of the Meuzin River.

Last is the slope of Vosne, where the texture of the wines changes, becoming smoother and less hard and therefore more sensual, and many of the wines pick up a spiciness that announces the approach of Vosne-Romanée and the closer one gets to Vosne, the more pronounced that character seems to become, although there can be variations due to altitude and soil. There are some great and greatly underrated vineyards in this part of Nuits, IMO, each with its own personality.

There are also a number of climats at the village level that can give very interesting wine.

[Berry_Crawford]

@Claude Kolm

As Ray points out, there is an almost impossibly large number of premiers crus, which I think stops most people from ever trying to sort out what’s really going on in Nuits, and instead they concentrate on a couple of vineyards that they like. But it’s actually not difficult at all to understand as the vineyards break into organizable units. The first and most important cut is to divide the vineyards in three: those at the south in Prémeaux-Prissey, those in the heart (i.e., north of the vineyards of Prémeaux-Prissey) up to the river that slices the town of Nuits in two, and then northern portion on the slope shared with Vosne-Romanée.

Starting with the Clos de la Maréchale, I find the wines of Prémeaux-Prissey are a bit lighter and more mineral than the others, although as one moves north to the Clos des Forêts and Didiers, they begin to fill out and increasingly resemble the wines of the heart of Nuits. One peculiarity is the premier cur Clos des Grandes Vignes which is east (downslope) from the route nationale, the only premier cru in Burgundy to have that dubious distinction.

The heart of Nuits is where one finds Les St-Georges, Vaucrains, Cailles, Porêts-St-Georges as well as less well-known but very vineyards such as Rue de Chaux, Chaboeufs, and les Procès. These are generally richer, more tannic wines, generally with dark fruit. Within this sector, there is quite a fascinating difference from one vineyard to another depending on soil and exposition. In particular, as one moves north, exposition changes from east to a more northerly direction and the vines are exposed to the winds that come down the valley of the Meuzin River.

Last is the slope of Vosne, where the texture of the wines changes, becoming smoother and less hard and therefore more sensual, and many of the wines pick up a spiciness that announces the approach of Vosne-Romanée and the closer one gets to Vosne, the more pronounced that character seems to become, although there can be variations due to altitude and soil. There are some great and greatly underrated vineyards in this part of Vosne, IMO, each with its own personality.

There are also a number of climats at the village level that can give very interesting wine.

Great info. Thank you.

[JimmyGillingham]

As someone who is new to Burgundy, I have been intimidated by the number of the 1er Crus. Claude, thanks for the “bigger picture” explanation. Sometimes it helps to see the forest and not just the trees.

[Jim_Anderson]

About 20% of the Red Burgs in my cellar are Nuits 1ers. Largely because of affinities for Arlot, Dujac, Gouges, Grivot, Mugnier and Chevillon. So I have a fairly broad representation of vineyards. I am looking forward to peoples’ notes on a bunch of wines. I’ll start out with this:

2002 Domaine de l’Arlot Clos Arlot: Classic Arlot nose of raspberry, tea, funky earth tones, bramble and baking spice. Mid-weight wine with seemingly more emphasis given to producer than site although Clos Arlot is such an unusual vineyard (and monopole) that this could also be a decent and more understated representation of this particular vineyard. Spiced red raspberries and baking cherries along with spiced tea dominate the mid-palate and are still youthful in their funky sort of way. Not an especially big or even necessarily extremely complex wine but definitely interesting, compelling and tasty for those who favor the style of the house. Still has several years left and could even come up a tick or two over the next 3-4 years. All in all quite good stuff.

[Claude_Kolm]

Another thing to point out – Nuits has no grand cru. The story goes that Henri Gouges, the most dynamic and well-known vigneron in Nuits during the mid-20th century (and one of the early and important vignerons to begin domaine bottling), didn’t propose Les Saint-Georges as a grand cru when the appellations were first being formed in the 1930s because he didn’t want to show up his neighbors who didn’t have vines there. That’s now thought to have been a mistake because the lack of a grand diminishes the prestige of all the wines of Nuits in the eyes of many who don’t know the wines well vis-a-vis the other major communes on the Côte de Nuits, all of which have grands crus: Vosne, Vougeot, Chambolle, Morey, and Gevrey.

There is now an application pending to upgrade Les Saint-Georges to grand cru status, although it will probably take 12-15 years for this to happen. Most informed observers think that the upgrade is merited (although it will not be in the top tiers in the hierarchy of grands crus), and the proposal generally is supported by those vignerons in Nuits who don’t have vines in LSG because it will raise the prestige of Nuits wines as a whole. The problem will be if there is a subsequent proposal for other vineyards to be elevated to grand cru – then the fighting will begin among those who have holdings in the other proposed vineyards and those who do not, and it could lead to proposals to upgrade perhaps four to six vineyards, way more than the INAO ever would grant. Yet, one can make plausible cases for each of those vineyards that they are at least the equal of LSG, if not superior to it.

[Berry_Crawford]

@Jim Anderson

About 20% of the Red Burgs in my cellar are Nuits 1ers. Largely because of affinities for Arlot, Dujac, Gouges, Grivot, Mugnier and Chevillon. So I have a fairly broad representation of vineyards. I am looking forward to peoples’ notes on a bunch of wines. I’ll start out with this:

2002 Domaine de l’Arlot Clos Arlot: Classic Arlot nose of raspberry, tea, funky earth tones, bramble and baking spice. Mid-weight wine with seemingly more emphasis given to producer than site although Clos Arlot is such an unusual vineyard (and monopole) that this could also be a decent and more understated representation of this particular vineyard. Spiced red raspberries and baking cherries along with spiced tea dominate the mid-palate and are still youthful in their funky sort of way. Not an especially big or even necessarily extremely complex wine but definitely interesting, compelling and tasty for those who favor the style of the house. Still has several years left and could even come up a tick or two over the next 3-4 years. All in all quite good stuff.

Did you get any bitterness on the finish? I had one on Christmas day and the longer it sat in the bottle, the more bitter it got

[Howard_Cooper]

Had a very nice Chevillon Nuits St. Georges les St. Georges 1998 about a week ago. Seemed mature - I don’t see it going downhill, but I also did not see the wine getting better. Sort of a nice combination of fruit flavors and secondary characteristics at this point. Medium bodied wine, not as big or as long as most good grand crus, but a pretty elegant wine for a NSG.

[maureen_nelson]

had a chevillon cailles 1996 a few weeks ago that had nice fruit but seemed too soft to me. Had Clavelier’s 01 Cras twice this winter - excellent both times and now, alas, absent from my cellar.

[Jim_Anderson]

@Berry Crawford

@Jim Anderson

About 20% of the Red Burgs in my cellar are Nuits 1ers. Largely because of affinities for Arlot, Dujac, Gouges, Grivot, Mugnier and Chevillon. So I have a fairly broad representation of vineyards. I am looking forward to peoples’ notes on a bunch of wines. I’ll start out with this:

2002 Domaine de l’Arlot Clos Arlot: Classic Arlot nose of raspberry, tea, funky earth tones, bramble and baking spice. Mid-weight wine with seemingly more emphasis given to producer than site although Clos Arlot is such an unusual vineyard (and monopole) that this could also be a decent and more understated representation of this particular vineyard. Spiced red raspberries and baking cherries along with spiced tea dominate the mid-palate and are still youthful in their funky sort of way. Not an especially big or even necessarily extremely complex wine but definitely interesting, compelling and tasty for those who favor the style of the house. Still has several years left and could even come up a tick or two over the next 3-4 years. All in all quite good stuff.

Did you get any bitterness on the finish? I had one on Christmas day and the longer it sat in the bottle, the more bitter it got

No, but I wouldn’t give the wine high marks for a great or substantially long finish. Thought it sort of had the typical small tannin laced with tea, blood and spice notes. I guess how it could be perceived as bitter though. I have a decent amount of these and I would hopefully give the next one a couple of years to see if the stuff in there that I think is somewhat disjointed can marry and give the wine a smoother overall sensation and longer, more complex finish.

[Lewis_Dawson]

Claude Kolm wrote… “There is now an application pending to upgrade Les Saint-Georges to grand cru status, although it will probably take 12-15 years for this to happen.” Claude, it already happened… see below.

Here is a link to last year’s thread on Nuit-Saint-Georges.

First division grand crus:
Other grand crus:
(None)

Quasi-Grand 1er Crus:
Les Saint-Georges

Elite 1er Crus:
Boudots
Cailles
Vaucrains
With reference to Claude’s excellent post above, these are the main “other contenders” in the grand cru discussion, IMO. I agree it is difficult to differentiate between them qualitatively. In the final analysis, I’ll go with those who say LSG is the most complete wine to be the standard-bearer for the commune. These elite premier crus can often deliver a “grand cru experience” IMO.

Other 1er Crus: All the other premier crus, 37 of them as per Ray’s list above. My personal honorable mention to Aux Cras and Murgers on the north (Vosne) side. I’m also fond of Clos de la Marechale, but that is the man as much as the dirt (monopole of Mugnier.)

[Berry_Crawford]

@Jim Anderson

@Berry Crawford

@Jim Anderson

About 20% of the Red Burgs in my cellar are Nuits 1ers. Largely because of affinities for Arlot, Dujac, Gouges, Grivot, Mugnier and Chevillon. So I have a fairly broad representation of vineyards. I am looking forward to peoples’ notes on a bunch of wines. I’ll start out with this:

2002 Domaine de l’Arlot Clos Arlot: Classic Arlot nose of raspberry, tea, funky earth tones, bramble and baking spice. Mid-weight wine with seemingly more emphasis given to producer than site although Clos Arlot is such an unusual vineyard (and monopole) that this could also be a decent and more understated representation of this particular vineyard. Spiced red raspberries and baking cherries along with spiced tea dominate the mid-palate and are still youthful in their funky sort of way. Not an especially big or even necessarily extremely complex wine but definitely interesting, compelling and tasty for those who favor the style of the house. Still has several years left and could even come up a tick or two over the next 3-4 years. All in all quite good stuff.

Did you get any bitterness on the finish? I had one on Christmas day and the longer it sat in the bottle, the more bitter it got

No, but I wouldn’t give the wine high marks for a great or substantially long finish. Thought it sort of had the typical small tannin laced with tea, blood and spice notes. I guess how it could be perceived as bitter though. I have a decent amount of these and I would hopefully give the next one a couple of years to see if the stuff in there that I think is somewhat disjointed can marry and give the wine a smoother overall sensation and longer, more complex finish.

Thanks. I only have one more and will probably wait for it to travel into full teriary land

[Nathan_V]

@Lewis Dawson

Claude Kolm wrote… “There is now an application pending to upgrade Les Saint-Georges to grand cru status, although it will probably take 12-15 years for this to happen.” Claude, it already happened… see below.

Here is a link to last year’s thread on Nuit-Saint-Georges.

First division grand crus:
Other grand crus:
(None)

Quasi-Grand 1er Crus:
Les Saint-Georges

Elite 1er Crus:
Boudots
Cailles
Vaucrains
With reference to Claude’s excellent post above, these are the main “other contenders” in the grand cru discussion, IMO. I agree it is difficult to differentiate between them qualitatively. In the final analysis, I’ll go with those who say LSG is the most complete wine to be the standard-bearer for the commune. These elite premier crus can often deliver a “grand cru experience” IMO.

Other 1er Crus: All the other premier crus, 37 of them as per Ray’s list above. My personal honorable mention to Aux Cras and Murgers on the north (Vosne) side. I’m also fond of Clos de la Marechale, but that is the man as much as the dirt (monopole of Mugnier.)

I’m liking a lot of what Lew is writing today and agree with everything here.

I had a great bottle of 1993 Jadot Boudots on Saturday night.

[ki_punwar]

I’ve really enjoyed Gouges-especially the Les St. Georges-and find them good values in many instances as well. Put me down as well on Clos De Marachale-Mugnier’s bottlings can be quite good…

[Berry_Crawford]

sticky for this thread?

[Lewis_Dawson]

I totally misjudged this wine at first sniff. Ah, the mysteries of Burgundy continue to enchant me…

Domaine Robert Chevillon 2001 1er Cru Les Vaucrains
Dark red color. Bloody, meaty nose is way “out there”. Ms. Burgundy, meet Mr. Cornas. But then it airs up and mellows out. At 90 minutes of decanting, it is positively elegant and totally captivating. The meatiness has melted away and turned to pure, uncut Vaucrains stoniness. Wow. This wine just bores into my psyche, she grabs my arm and her grip is strong and she looks me in the eye and she says, “I am Nuits-Saint-Georges, I am Les Vaucrains”. Yes Ma’am.

Exceptional. Now and next 10-15 years.

[john_stimson]

@Nathan V.

@Lewis Dawson

Claude Kolm wrote… “There is now an application pending to upgrade Les Saint-Georges to grand cru status, although it will probably take 12-15 years for this to happen.” Claude, it already happened… see below.

Here is a link to last year’s thread on Nuit-Saint-Georges.

First division grand crus:
Other grand crus:
(None)

Quasi-Grand 1er Crus:
Les Saint-Georges

Elite 1er Crus:
Boudots
Cailles
Vaucrains
With reference to Claude’s excellent post above, these are the main “other contenders” in the grand cru discussion, IMO. I agree it is difficult to differentiate between them qualitatively. In the final analysis, I’ll go with those who say LSG is the most complete wine to be the standard-bearer for the commune. These elite premier crus can often deliver a “grand cru experience” IMO.

Other 1er Crus: All the other premier crus, 37 of them as per Ray’s list above. My personal honorable mention to Aux Cras and Murgers on the north (Vosne) side. I’m also fond of Clos de la Marechale, but that is the man as much as the dirt (monopole of Mugnier.)

I’m liking a lot of what Lew is writing today and agree with everything here.

I had a great bottle of 1993 Jadot Boudots on Saturday night.

Had this bottle a couple of months ago as part of a 93 boudots tasting and would agree it’s showing very well–spicy deep red fruit with a slight saline character. I’ll see if I can pull together a report tomorrow on the other 8 boudots’ that we did.

[Tyler_McAfee]

Lewis, great note. Amazing that after all the critical praise bestowed upon these wines over the last decade, the entire lineup still sells for under $100 per.

[john_stimson]

@Lewis Dawson

I totally misjudged this wine at first sniff. Ah, the mysteries of Burgundy continue to enchant me…

Domaine Robert Chevillon 2001 1er Cru Les Vaucrains
Dark red color. Bloody, meaty nose is way “out there”. Ms. Burgundy, meet Mr. Cornas. But then it airs up and mellows out. At 90 minutes of decanting, it is positively elegant and totally captivating. The meatiness has melted away and turned to pure, uncut Vaucrains stoniness. Wow. This wine just bores into my psyche, she grabs my arm and her grip is strong and she looks me in the eye and she says, “I am Nuits-Saint-Georges, I am Les Vaucrains”. Yes Ma’am.

Exceptional. Now and next 10-15 years.

Lewis–we had the 93 Vaucrains as part of our second installement of NSG 93 tasting. A really interesting wine with lots going on and beautifully mature. I knew it was Chevillon, just couldn’t place the vineyard (we did it blind). I must say that I haven’t had a huge number of chevillon bottlings, but so far I find them very interesting, engaging, wonderfully well made wines with character and place, etc. However i have yet to have an epiphany. For me they are sort of like Montrose in Bordeaux–lots going on and very interesting, but I prefer a different style. And I have a little bit of that problem with NSG in general. I’d never turn down a good NSG, but I tend to prefer other communes–I like a little more purity of fruit, plus the ‘sex in a bottle’ feel that some burgs provide seems to be lacking. Who knows–maybe I just need to keep trying.