2004 Burgundy Red Wine - How Bad is it?

It is commonly said that 2004 is the worst recent vintage for red wine in Burgundy. The weather was not good - lots of rain and a lot of rot. But that in itself is probably not the biggest problem with the 2004's. As Bill Nanson of Burgundy Report first wrote about, ladybugs were all over the vineyards in 2004. I heard that they were released to combat some or other aphid, but I cannot substantiate that claim. In any case, when ladybugs are trying to attract a mate or are under duress, they release a chemical of a class called methoxy-pyrazines. This chemical can cause off aromas in wine that are often described as green. But not in the unripe sense, in otherwise ripe wines, it is a vegetal, raw cedar, seaweedy, unpleasant aroma and taste. Anyway, the ladybugs, and if not the bugs then the chemicals they released, ended up mixed in with the grapes as they fermented. Not in every wine, obviously, but in some - perhaps as many as 30% of total red wines were affected.

I bought some 2004 wines. I was feeling rather pessimistic about their potential until a few months ago when Peter Wasserman told me that the wines are improving, losing the smell. I decided that I wanted to explore the 2004's - are they really as bad as they're supposed to be? So I got together with a group of Burgundy loving friends who all dug deeply into their cellars and we drank a load of wine - top producers, from villages to Grand Cru.

Here are the wines we drank, in the order that we drank them with our dinner:

Jean-Marc Morey Beaune 1er Cru Grèves.
François Gaunoux Pommard 1er Cru Rugiens.
JF Mugnier Chambolle-Musigny.
Ghislaine Barthod Chambolle-Musigny.
Fourrier Gevrey-Chambertin.
Fourrier Gevrey-Chambertin 1er Cru Cherbaudes.
Sylvie Esmonin Gevrey-Chambertin Vieille Vignes.
Robert Chevillon Nuits St. Georges 1er Cru Les Chaignots.
Mugneret-Gibourg Nuits St. Georges 1er Cru Les Chaignots.
Sylvain Cathiard Nuits St. Georges 1er Cru Aux Murgers.
Robert Chevillon Nuits St. Georges 1er Cru Les Pruliers.
Robert Chevillon Nuits St. Georges 1er Cru Les Saint-Georges.
Hudelot-Noëllat Vosne-Romanée 1er Cru Les Beaumonts.
Hudelot-Noëllat Vosne-Romanée 1er Cru Les Suchots.
Hudelot-Noëllat Vosne-Romanée Grand Cru Romanée St. Vivant.
Jean Tardy Echezeaux Vieille Vignes.

I have no tasting notes to share with you because I didn't take any, but you can read Keith Levenberg's notes here. I want to share some thoughts, though.

People generally agreed that the wines showed better than expected. There were a few that I would call excellent wines, wines that lived up to their potential in a difficult vintage. At the same time, people said that they wouldn't run to the stores to buy them. There were some delicious wines that seemed to me to be in perfect place for drinking. The Fourrier Gevrey-Chambertin, for example - I thought it was great. I liked its clarity and purity, its clean and very pretty fruit. I thought it showcased Fourrier's sheer and elegant style. I also thought Morey's Beaune Grèves was in a good spot for immediate drinking. And although the oak was more prominent than I might like, I thought that Mugnier's Chambolle was a lovely wine.

And the thing is, some of the others at the table experienced those wines completely differently. I didn't hear anything negative about the Fourrier wine, but I did hear some say that the Beaune was too oaky, and that the Mugnier wine was clunky, that they preferred the Barthod Chambolle. Hmmm, I found the Barthod wine to be essentially undrinkable. The roasted seaweed and vegetal aromas were just too much for me. But others liked the wine, and I love the fact that this whole thing is complicated enough so that a group of people sharing the same bottles could have such a diverse take on them.

Some of the wines showed the off aromas and flavors that 2004 is accused of. I found the Barthod Chambolle to be the greatest offender, but the two Chaignots and Hudelot-Noëllat's Beaumonts also showed green to me. I thought the Pommard was affected too, but others disagreed, saying that it was just the odd expression of minerality in a good young Pommard Rugiens. I was not convinced. Until I drank the leftovers on day three and the wine was absolutely lovely - crushed stones and flowers, with no traces of green. There may have been others that were affected and I missed them - not everyone agreed with me when I thought a wine smelled or tasted green.

Some of the wines greatly improved over the course of a few days, shedding bulk, gaining definition. For example, I wasn't moved by Sylvie Esmonin's Gevrey Chambertin during our dinner. I found it to be a big wine that didn't show much other than ripe fruit. But on day three it was far more articulate, showing intensity and detail, and a lovely earthy finish. The wines that initially showed green aromas and flavors, however, did not lose those aromas and flavors over the course of several days. Perhaps the 2004 green wines will not lose the green?

The group seemed to agree that 2004 is a vintage in which the quality of the wines very closely adheres to the relative nobility of terroir. For example, as good as the Fourrier villages wine was, its 1er Cru counterpart showed that much more nuance and distinction. I thought this wine was just excellent, and if I owned any I would cellar it for another 8 years or so, the way I would any good 1er Cru from a good producer.

Similarly, Chevillon's 1er Cru Pruliers was good. But Les Saint-Georges was a great wine, a wine that in my opinion was everything Les Saint-Georges is supposed to be - full of ripe and rich dark fruit, perfectly structured and balanced, and with lots of depth and complexity that is just beginning to hint at itself at this early stage in its life.

Hudelot-Noëllat's 1er Cru Suchots was good, especially on days two and three, but the Grand Cru was a very big step up. I thought that it, along with Les Saint-Georges, were the two finest wines on the table.

So, 2004 Burgundy Red Wine - How Bad is it? At this point I would say this: not as bad as you might think. Focus on the wines from the best terroirs. Give the wines time to develop like you would in a typical vintage. And if you have a wine that was affected by the greenies, it might be a simple case of bad luck - doesn't seem like the green aromas are going anywhere, not any time soon, at least.

How Long Should a Wine Age?

I've always been attracted to things that are defined by a concrete set of rules. What attracts me most is when, given a thorough understanding of the rules, it is possible to be creative in solving problems within that system. Chess, baseball, music, poker...these are some of the things I'm talking about.

Wine fits in here too. There are plenty of rules one can use in understanding the universe of wine - places, grape varieties allowed, methods of elevage, and so on. There are people out there, you've probably met them too, whose appreciation of wine seems to derive from an elevated level of scholarship - they treat it like a science. And that's fine. But there is loads of room for creativity too. How long a wine should age, for example - I've been thinking for a while now about this problem, and to me the answers involve creativity, not a set of rules.

I wish there were a set of rules to follow, some sort of list I could use to answer this question. But there just isn't. Imagine:

Vouvray sec - 8 years
Vouvray demi-sec - 14 years
Anything by Huet or Foreau - 23 years
And so on...

Obviously the vagaries of vintage quality, producer quality, terroir quality, vine age, wine making technique, and countless others make it impossible to make such a list.

Yet, you have, if not a list, something in your mind that guides your hand when making decisions about aging wine. How did you form your set of rules? I am still in the process of forming mine. I began by reading and talking to friends, and this definitely served me well. But I'm committed now to experimenting for myself, building my knowledge through trial and error and through the generosity of others. After all, my preferences might not be the same as yours, so just because you say that Fourrier's wines need at least 10 years in a typical vintage, shouldn't I try to find out for myself?

And take a step back for a moment - what does it even mean to say "needs at least 10 years?" Needs 10 years in order to be what, exactly? Ready to drink? Fully mature? Less tannic and in a better state of balance? I read statements like "needs at least 10 years" all the time, and it's not that I think that they're wrong, bad, or silly. But I read them and can accept them as truth, and yet I sometimes have no idea what they're referring to - I've never had a 10 year old Fourrier, for example.

How often do you drink old/mature wine? Unless you often buy at auction, or have been buying and cellaring wine for a very long time, you're probably like me - you drink scores of younger wines for every truly mature bottle you drink.

If I'm buying an age worthy wine, a good red Burgundy, for example, I'm a believer in buying three bottles and drinking one when young in order to know the wine in that phase of its life. That way I will better understand the changes when I next drink it, whenever that is. But when should that be? I remember asking my friend Peter about this as we drove from one cellar tasting to another in Burgundy a little over a year ago. He said "If you're talking about the top wines, good 1er Crus and Grand Crus, things like that, when in doubt, use the 12 year rule. Try a bottle in the 12th year out from the vintage - drink a 2002 in 2014, for example. It's unlikely that a really good wine would be tired or dead at that point, and there's a good chance that the wine will be drinking well."

Hmmm, the 12 year rule. I know I began by saying that the answer involves creativity, not rules. But Peter was suggesting 12 years as a guideline to use when in doubt, and he meant that the drinker should evaluate the wine at that point and determine whether or not it requires further time.

But what about good villages wines, does the 12 year rule apply to them as well? I asked him this recently and he said that the reasoning behind the 12 year rule is the fact that most good Burgundy wine can be quite drinkable in its youth but then a few years out from the vintage it shuts down and becomes quite closed. At 12 years, give or take, it emerges as a mature wine. With villages wine, it might not take 12 years. With great wine in a vintage like 2004, it might not require 12 years. In a high-acid vintage like 1999, it might take more than 12 years for a great wine to mellow and show at its best. So that one bottle of 1999 Lafarge Clos des Chênes I have, I'm going to give it a few years past 2011. In 2009 Peter and I drank a bottle of 1995 Mugneret-Gibourg Echezeaux and it was good, but the wine wasn't fully resolved - the structure was still too prominent, and we both felt that with a few more years it would have shown better. But in 2009 we also drank a bottle of 1995 Chandon de Briailles Corton Clos du Roi and it was a thing of beauty, in a perfect place. Again, even when trying to apply the 12 year rule, the answers require creativity.

Last week in San Diego I had the chance, thanks to the generosity of my father-in-law, to drink a few old wines and I learned a tremendous amount from them. I already told you about the 1986 Margaux, but on another night we drank a 1988 Château Léoville Las Cases and it was superb, I preferred it to the Margaux. It was full of tobacco and leather, the only fruit really was a bit of dark cassis on the finish. There was a tactile texture to the wine and the acidity was still vibrant - the wine was nowhere near tired, it was very much fresh and alive. If I had more of this I would drink it now, it's delicious and what would I be waiting for? So my new rule - good Bordeaux needs exactly 22 years. A joke, friends, a joke. But really, I learned that good old Bordeaux is really good wine, and perhaps it isn't made the same way it was in the '80's and before that, but it's too easy to write off Bordeaux as spoof-city over-priced silliness. My guess is that it once was a great thing.

And how about this - on our last night we drank a 1977 Ruffino Chianti Classico Riserva Ducale. Pop-pop brought this wine back from Italy a long time ago. I know nothing about Chianti, and my association with Ruffino wasn't great. But I loved this wine, loved it. So leathery and earthy, but with lots of sour cherry too, and all of the aromas and flavors were crystal clear. There was still structure too, and good acidity. And the finish was glorious, this unending wash of cherry and leather fragrance. So, what would happen if I aged a bottle of the 2007 Pian del Ciampolo for 33 years? My guess is it would be awesome. Or maybe it would be tired and brown. Who knows.

I hope I have the patience to cellar wines for decades like this. The rewards can be so great.

The Glory of Turnip Greens and Bacon

Right now I'm eating a bowl of orecchiette with turnip greens, and it's completely delicious. I seasoned the dish with a little bacon, a small garlic clove, a few dried red chili flakes, and a very small glug of cream. Bound it all together with a good glug of the pasta cooking water. This is the kind of pasta dish that my Jewish father from the Bronx would be frustrated by. "It has no sauce," he would say. "It needs a sauce."


In my rudimentary (and rudimentary is a generous word here) understanding of pasta, pastas with fillings, like ravioli, are not meant to be sauced. Some brown butter and sage, perhaps, but no ragu, no pesto, no clam sauce. Those sauces are for spaghetti, penne, linguini, and other un-filled pastas.

So in a sense, my father would be right - my orecchiette dish doesn't have a sauce, and it's not a filled pasta, so it should have a sauce. But I'm using the pasta as a vehicle to enjoy the glorious combination of braised turnip greens and bacon, and for me, that is sauce enough. Of the various braising greens such as collards, kale, and chard, my favorite for braising are turnip greens. They have great texture and a nice earthy-turnip flavor, and they absorb other flavors very well. They have a particular affinity for cured or smoked pork products, and thankfully, humans discovered and widely shared this bit of culinary knowledge.

Turnips are in season. If you buy turnips, save the greens and try something like this dish. Think about this: turnip greens = earthy, bacon = umami, chili flakes = spicy, garlic = savory, and cream = sweet. An almost complete combination, but no sour. I considered a squeeze of lemon for sour, but it somehow didn't seem right.

When I decided to make this dish, I had no particular wine in mind. I considered a St. Joseph, imagining the marriage of bacon flavors. But I decided that Syrah, particularly young Syrah, which is all I own, would overpower everything but the bacon. I considered a snappy and vibrant bottle of Pian del Ciampolo, the un-oaked Sangiovese from Montevertine, but sadly, I don't actually own any of that wine. I considered a white from Friuli, like the i Clivi Galea, the Tocai/Malvasia blend, and in retrospect, that probably would have been a great pairing.

But I drank the 2007 Mugneret-Gibourg Bourgogne, $32, Michael Skurnik Wines. A lovely Bourgogne, not as impressive as the 2006, as the 2007 doesn't seem to handle its wood treatment as well, but lovely nonetheless. Why did I open this bottle? Because sometimes agonizing over the right pairing is tiring, especially when I am putting the kids to bed, stressing about work, and simply feeling tired. I wanted comfort. For me, this wine conjures something very comforting. And if it totally failed with the pasta, I could recork it and open something else. It didn't fail, it was fine. But this dish deserves better than fine.

May I ask, what would you pour with this type of pasta dish?

Wine of the Week - Mugneret-Gibourg Bourgogne

2006 Domaine Mugneret-Gibourg Bourgogne, $32, Michael Skurnik Imports. Every year I try to buy a couple of high end bottles to put away in the cellar, but also a few "lesser" wines by great producers, wines to enjoy when young. File this in the lesser wines from great producers department. Not to say that is a lesser wine - it is a fantastic Bourgogne. But within the Mugneret-Gibourg portfolio it is low end, and therefore accessibly priced.

I think of Mugneret-Gibourg the way I think of Fourrier or Ghislaine Barthod - each well known among Burgundy lovers as rising stars, each making wines of stunning purity and grace that provide a clear window to terroir. In a region of expensive wine, Mugneret-Gibourg wines are not cheap - they command between $50-80 just for villages-level wines, 1er Crus now cost upwards of $85 per bottle. There are three Grand-Cru classified wines: Clos Vougeot, Échezeaux, and Ruchottes-Chambertin, and these wines cost what Grand Cru Burgundy costs, although some would argue that they offer great value even at the $165 plus per bottle, as they represent some of the finest examples of wine from those places.

What about the humble Bourgogne? At $32, does it offer good value? I can emphatically say yes. First of all, it is delicious wine, offering everything one could want in a young Bourgogne. And relative to other regional wines, I think this this is among the better ones. It shows a lovely perfume of pure ripe dark fruit, and with a little air there are interesting spice, smoke and herbal notes. Even with a few hours of air, though, the nose is not entirely open. This wine, even though it is a humble Bourgogne, has the structure to improve in the cellar for a few more years.

This wine comes from vines that were once classified as villages-level Vosne-Romanée, in a plot called Les Lutinières, just north of Nuits St Georges. The wine reflects some of the character of both of those places, with sweet spicy dark fruit and a gamy undertone on the palate. It is impeccably pure and fresh and just a pleasure to drink, and it is balanced and transparent as seems to be the character of the 2006 vintage, a vintage that I imagine will never be given the credit it should in the shadow of the massive 2005.

Excellent from the moment I pulled the cork, what put this wine into "wow" territory for me was how incredibly detailed the palate became after about 90 minutes open. It was as if I could taste the jet-black skins, and their spicy juice, the seeds and stems, the soil, and the tiny bit of wood. Detail like that requires remarkably pure fruit and clean wine making. Maybe it was the beautiful sunlight seeping through the trees on our deck, my sleeping kids, and dinner with my lovely wife, but I think the wine was amazing too.

I'm excited to re-visit this wine in about three years. And even more excited to one day open the fancier Mugneret-Gibourg wines that are just beginning their long sleep in my cellar.

Good Beef, Villages Wine, and Buying Strategy

My TGV high speed train arrived in Dijon at noon. Peter and Tista picked me up at the station immediately after their visit to the Domaine de la Romanée Conti. I don't really know what else to say - I arrived too late for the DRC visit and there was no way to do anything about it. I've made it 37 years without tastsing the wines, I guess I can wait a few more.

We had a 3:00 PM appointment with Frédéric (people seem to call him Freddy, but I barely know the guy) Mugnier's, and a 5:00 PM with Christophe Roumier. I was operating on about 3 hours of airplane sleep and a magnum of 2008 Adrenalin by Brooklynguy. Lunch was definitely in order, and so we went to La Toute Petite Auberge in Vosne-Romanée where I ate a wonderful entrecôte of Charolais beef. I've had Charolais maybe four times now, only in Burgundy, and I love how deeply beefy it is without feeling heavy. Salt and pepper - that's really all it needs, and that's all it got at La Toute Petite Auberge. People - I hereby encourage you to order the Charolais beef, if you have the opportunity.

Peter graciously handed me the wine list and told me to select a bottle. Uh-uh, no way. I had just arrived, I was totally wired and wigged out, and even under normal circumstances it would be scary to select wine for lunch with him. I demurred, and he chose a bottle of 2004 Mugneret-Gibourg Vosne-Romanée.

Peter turned to me, swirling the wine in his glass, and said "Burgundy Dilettantes would turn their noses at this wine, but I think it's really good." And it was. It was sweet and earthy, elegant and delicious. "Not a great vintage and only a village-level wine," Peter continued, "but it's drinking really well right now."

If I only had vines outside my backdoor...

This got me thinking. If money were no object, I would buy that 04 we had with out lunch for my own cellar. But I have to be selective about what I buy. If your Burgundy buying budget is moderate, as is mine, what's the best way to buy? Imagine, for example, that you have $400 to spend each year on Burgundy wine. Do you focus on quality, and buy only 3 or 4 bottles of things like Chandon de Briailles Corton Bressandes, Michel Lafarge Volnay 1er Cru Clos des Chênes, Hudelot-Noellat Vosne-Romanée 1er Cru Aux Malconsorts, and Domaine Dujac Morey St. Denis 1er Cru? Use up you whole wad every year on only a few bottles of phenomenal wine that will blow you and your guests away when you eventually drink them?

Or, do you buy at least twice as many wines, also of very high quality, but not at the same level? I'm talking about Fourrier Gevrey-Chambertin, Chandon de Briailles Pernand Vergelesses 1er Cru Ile des Vergelesses, Simon Bize Savigny-les-Beaune 1er Cru Aux Fournaux, Lafarge Volnay Villages, things like that?

It would be extreme, but you could buy a bottle of Dujac Vosne-Romanée 1er Cru Aux Malconsorts and a bottle of Rousseau Charmes Chambertin and call it a year. I know, only two bottles. But imagine how good they'll be in 12 years.

I'm happy with the little Burgundy cellar I've amassed, but I'm way over-represented by $50 wines. This trip made me realize that I want to spend my Burgundy dollars next year, maybe the year after too, on fewer wines of higher caliber. Maybe I can say that only because I've already got some mid-level beauties to look forward to. In any case, I'm already imagining how much fun it will be in 25 years to open my 2006 Chandon de Briailles Grand Cru Corton Clos de Roi. And my 2006 Mugneret-Gibourg Nuits St Georges 1er Cru Les Chaignots. That's what I'm talking about.

Burgundy Dilittantes - nothing to snub your nose at over here. At least regarding my 2006's and next year my 2007's. If you feel the need to snub my 3 bottles of $28 2005 Lafouge Auxey-Duresses1er Cru La Chapelle, so be it.