By the Glass - Burgundy Complaints Edition

It is almost cliché to say that Burgundy is a crap shoot, every bottle a roll of the dice. But that's because it's true. Price and quality can have a rather distant relationship, and there can be great variations in climate just within one village. Which part of Volnay was hit by hail in 2001? Better check on that before spending $75 on a Lafarge Clos du Château des Ducs. Was it northern or southern Vosne-Romanée that got heavy rain and then a lot of rot in 2006? Best to find out before spending your $80 on Hudelot-Noëllat's Malconsorts - maybe Les Suchots should be better.

If you're into Burgundy, you know I'm not kidding or exaggerating. Malconsorts and Suchots are within a stone's throw of one another (if a major league ball player were throwing the stone), but they will always produce different wines - and that's a terroir issue. I'm talking about weather problems like hail or heavy rain or some other climatic stress, when a producer makes adjustments in the vineyards and sometimes in the cellar, and makes the best wines they can. But when the best they can is merely decent or average wine, (or very good wine that you got a bad bottle of), it's still Lafarge Clos du Château des Ducs or Hudelot-Noëllat Les Suchots, and it still costs $75.

For folks like me who buy two or three bottles per year at that price, it's a matter of risk reduction. I choose solid producers, and then wines from vineyards that interest me and that are not mentioned in bad weather reports. I do exactly the same thing when buying Burgundy wine in the $20-40 zone, the range that I tend to live in. And it's just as much of a guessing game in the end. Lauded vintages don't always translate to great wines, and so on.

Why do I keep doing it, although I feel like I "waste" more money on Burgundy that I do anywhere else? Because I fell so hard for the exquisite wines I've drank, that I continue to chase that feeling. And you never know where you'll find that feeling - a $25 bottle of Bourgogne can be exquisite.

Here are some wines that I've had recently at home with meals, some disappointing, others surprisingly good. I'll list them in descending order by price, and you'll see how frustrating the whole thing can be:

2001 Philippe Pacalet Pommard, $45. I bought two bottles because I served this wine to friends during their birthday dinner. On that night it seemed a bit tired and lifeless. We didn't need the 2nd bottle that evening, and opened it a month later without expectations. It was absolutely delicious - zesty and fresh with beautifully clean fruit, and with almost completely resolved tannins that made the whole thing feel luxurious and soft. But I spent $90 on these two bottles, and only one of them was worth it.

2004 Hudelot-Noëllat Vosne-Romanée 1er Cru Les Beaux Monts, $43. When we opened it it seemed like it was going to be utterly gorgeous, an explosion of vibrant dark fruit and earthy spice. But it was all downhill from there with a dilute mid-palate, and after two hours open it was marred by a distinct ashtray type of smell that rendered it essentially undrinkable to me. This wine suffered from a case of under-ripe tannins, and no amount of cellaring can fix that. By the way, my friend whose house I brought this wine to really liked it, and he has a great palate, so what do I know.

2002 Domaine René Engel Vosne-Romanée, $28. Yes, laugh with me at that price. It's essentially impossible to find any village Vosne wine these days for under $40. 2002 is supposed to be such a great year, and this is a good producer (although that reputation grew under a different wine maker). Pleasant dark fruit and soil aromas, a bit of volatile acidity that blows off quickly, some underbrush shows with air. Pleasant and tasty wine, but not complex, and the simplicity becomes a distraction for me. For whatever it's worth, I'm not sure that there is much of a Vosne stamp either.

2005 Lafouge Auxey-Duresses 1er Cru Les Duresses, $27. I liked this wine when it was first released and full of dried leaves. Now the fruit is more prominent, and it's even better. There is still underbrush and some lovely spice too. Great wine, and makes me excited for the other 1er Crus from Lafouge that are sleeping in my cellar.

2005 Domaine des Croix Bourgogne, $25. I loved this wine when I drank it a year ago, but this time it was dominated by wood. And I wonder, can this much wood really integrate? Some would say it can, but I am reminded of something that Jeremy Seysses of Domaine Dujac said in December when leading us through his 2007's in barrel - he thinks that ripe vintages do not take to wood as well as other vintages, that the oak integrates better in the long term in a vintage like 2006 over 2005. If I'm misrepresenting what he said, hopefully Peter or Tista will read this and correct me.

2005 Catherine et Claude Maréchal Bourgogne Cuvée Gravel, $25. I am a fan of this producer, but this wine was simply too ripe. It came across as sweet and out of balance, with awfully prominent alcohol considering the 13% on the label. The 2007 is beautiful and balanced, a wine of grace and interest, and it's the same price.

2005 René LeClerc Bourgogne, $25. Needs a decant or just time for the carbon dioxide to find its way out of the wine. Very pure and good intensity of fruit, and shows an orange zest earthiness that for me is very Gevrey-Chambertin. A very lovely wine. Why is this 2005 Bourgogne lovely and the above two not as lovely, my personal taste aside? Leclerc's Bourgogne vines are in Gevrey somewhere, and perhaps they experienced more favorable climate than the Savigny-based vines of Maréchal or the Beaune and Pommard based vines of Des Croix.

2006 René LeClerc Bourgogne, $19. Drinkable, but not a successful wine. The aromatic profile is heavy with underbrush, and the fruit never really asserts itself. The palate is light bodied and rustic - a bit muddy almost.

2004 Dureuil-Janthial Rully Maizières, $18. 2004 was a difficult vintage for reds that deservedly has a mediocre reputation, and although the region's wines have been improving, the Côte Chalonnaise as a whole is not particularly distinguished terroir. I took a shot on this wine because the producer is one of the best in the Côte Chalonnaise, and because the price seemed reasonable. And it of course defied all expectations and was completely delicious with bright fruit, nice acidity, a bit of earthiness, and fully resolved tannins. Had I only known, I would have bought two bottles instead of the Hudelot-Noëllat and still saved a couple of bucks.

If you can truly figure out this whole Burgundy thing, then more power to you.

There's Titanium in the Glass

I was down to my last two Burgundy glasses and we were having my friend Deetrane and his family over for dinner to celebrate his birthday. One of the wines I wanted to pour was the 2001 Philippe Pacalet Pommard (a bit over the hill, as it turned out, but that's another story). So on a rainy Saturday afternoon a took my 2 year old daughter into The City, as we Brooklynites call it. We went to a popular kitchen/dining/that-kind-of-thing store and I picked out four Schott-Zwiesel Burgundy glasses. I'm not buying Riedel anymore as daily drinking glasses because no matter how careful I am, I break one glass every month or so, minimum. Riedel glasses are $20 each, Schott-Zwiesel glasses are also quite nice, and are half the price. Settled.

I had my daughter in one arm, the box of glasses in my other hand, and I put them on the checkout counter. The young woman behind the counter said "Oh, these are great glasses! Did you know that there is titanium in them?" No, I didn't know that.

Titanium is something of a wonder-metal. It is light, not all that dense, but very strong, easy to blend with other metals to create useful alloys for things ranging from aircraft engines to plastics to the outer coating of household tools. And apparently now, wine glasses. It makes perfect sense - titanium's lightness and strength, it's white color, and the relative ease with which it can be alloyed make it a great choice for stemware.

I reacted with surprise, so did my daughter, and the saleswoman said "Let me show you." She opened the box and took out one of the glasses. With a sudden movement she raised it up in her hand and banged it down on the counter, really banged it, smacking the bowl of the wine glass onto the wood. There was a loud "Gong" and I of course recoiled, trying to shield my daughter from what would certainly be a cascade of glass shards. But the glass did not break. Clearly this is the glass for me.

I laughed nervously and said "Wow, that's great, I'll just move my two year old out of the way next time," and she laughed, and again, more quickly this time, banged the glass on the counter. But this time it did break. It broke kind of like a windshield, a spider web of cracks and a few large chunks flew about the counter. Scary - what if glass had hit my daughter's face? But impressive too - even though she smashed it like you would use a hammer to strike a nail, the glass did not shatter.

Everyone was fine of course (except the saleswoman, who I'm guessing is not entirely fine in the head), and I still bought the glasses. And I haven't broken any yet. Then again, I haven't repeated the saleswoman's experiment.

Same Terroir, Different Hands

I was thinking about my Burgundy trip the other night at 3:30 am while rocking a squalling baby in the crook of my arm. We sampled well over 100 wines from barrel representing many different terroirs. Some we sampled only once, such as the phenomenal Vosne-Romanee 1er Cru Les Gaudichots at Lucien Le Moine. We did get to sample several wines from the same terroir, though. Wouldn’t it be interesting, I thought, to list them all, to see the wines that occurred most frequently? To compare the expressions of terroir in different highly capable hands?

This is the kind of thing that can fascinate you at 3:30 am with screaming baby. If what follows is of little interest, I ask that you either bear with me, or print this out and save it until you have a baby. Then pull it out at 3:30 am and you'll see…

So I found that the most commonly occurring terroirs across our visits were Bonnes Mares and Charmes Chambertin, both Grand Cru, both tasted four times. An interesting duo, if I may say so. Neither of these is in the most elite class of Grand Cru wines, although Bonnes Mares is probably a notch higher than Charmes Chambertin. Moreover, these wines have personalities that might be described as polar opposites.

Bonnes Mares is interesting in that it spreads across two villages. About 14 of its 15 hectares are in Chambolle-Musigny and one lone hectare, the northern most portion, is in Morey St. Denis. The wines in general are said to be dense and masculine, highly structured and unyielding in their youth. I've never had a mature Bonnes Mares, so I cannot comment on what happens with age. Reference standards include Dujac, Roumier, and Mugnier.

Charmes Chambertin is one of the Gevrey-Chambertin Grand Crus, bordering Chambertin to the west and the villages-classified Champs-Chenys to the east. The wines in general are said to be, as the name might suggest, charming, with elegant red fruit and finesse, and a subtle power running underneath. I don't know who are the reference standard producers. I'm going to guess Dugat, Roty,Rousseau, and maybe Bachelet.

I am not presenting this as a comprehensive study of these two Grand Crus in 2007. It is just a set of tasting notes, that’s it. But as you’ll see, there are some interesting similarities and differences among the wines. The Bonnes Mares wines seemed to exhibit similar characteristics across the board, although Le Moine's was more immediately drinkable than the others. The Charmes Chambertins were a bit more varied, and maybe that's because they sometimes and sometimes not contain grapes from neighboring Mazoyeres Chambertin.

Mounir Saouma of Lucien Le Moine.

Here are the notes on the 2007 Bonnes Mares:

JF Mugnier Bonnes Mares – savoury nose, so much so that I spelled savoury with a “u.” Umami all the way. Deep dark fruit on the palate, incredibly dense and difficult for me to really taste. Mugnier pours this before he pours his 1er Cru Amoureuses.

Georges/Christophe Roumier Bonnes Mares – Reticent nose, some umami notes with coaxing. Dark plums on the palate, lots of extract, leaves something minty after swallowing, which is quite appealing. This was poured after the Amoureuses.

Lucien Le Moine Bonnes Mares – Nose of deeply perfumed fruit and hoisin sauce. On the palate sweet dark fruit, plums, hoisin, lots of sap, great length and purity. There is a stony mineral grip, and a minty aftertaste.

Domaine Dujac Bonnes Mares – Smoky nose, dark plums and hoisin, an energetic core of aroma. Closed on the palate, but there are hints of dark fruits and the minerality is evident. The finish is deeply fragrant with herbs, very complex.

Terroir whizzing by our car's window.

And now the assortment of 2007 Charmes Chambertins:

Georges/Christophe Roumier Charmes Chambertin – wide open nose of fresh fruit and baking spices, hints of black tea. Very pretty red fruit on the palate with great acidity, sappy and deep. Lovely wine.

Philippe Pacalet Charmes Chambertin - incredibly dense nose of spicy fruit, orange peel, and minerals. Elegant and powerful, and still somewhat closed, if you can believe that. Rich and deep on the palate, the wine spreads out and coats the mouth with gentle red fruit. There is great clarity here, balance, poise, richness, and a powerful core of fruit.

Armand Rousseau Charmes Chambertin - A bit reductive on the nose, but still lovely with roses, tar, and tea. Sappy red berries on the palate, great acidity, very elegant with a fragrant rose petal finish. Very pretty wine.

Domaine Dujac Charmes Chambertin - Nose is quite closed, but the palate shows a core of deep fruit, baking spices, and a bit of oak with nice fruit-filled length. Dense right now, hard to evaluate.

Visiting Philippe Pacalet

We visited some of the very top producers in Burgundy - Mugnier, Roumier, Pierre Morey, Pacalet, L'Arlot, Le Moine, Rousseau, and Dujac. Every visit without exception was excellent, an incredible learning experience, compelling wines, and the excitement each time of walking into a dark cellar full of barrels, glass in hand - what wines will they pour and what will they taste like?

One of my favorites was our visit to the cellars of Philippe Pacalet in Beaune. Some top wine bloggers (Bert, Alice, Bert again) have already written informative pieces about Philippe Pacalet. In summary I can tell you this: Pacalet is the nephew of Marcel Lapierre, the legendary natural wine maker in Beaujolais. Pacelet, like his uncle, removes anything from the vinification process that obscures the pure expression of terroir. He therefore does not use industrial yeasts to aid in fermentation and he uses sulfur only at bottling. Generally, this is a guy is completely hands-off. Interestingly, Pacalet does not own his own vines - he buys grapes. Of course he buys from people who farm as he would, without excessive chemicals, but I'm sure it's a challenge to ensure that grapes are grown according to his standards.

2007 Beaune 1er Cru Les Perrieres in bottles, waiting for labels.

Pacalet's wines are known for their purity and for their transparency to the underlying terroir, and 2007 seems to be a vintage that will lend itself quite well to his style - not terribly warm, just a "classic" Burgundy vintage. Tasting through the lineup was thrilling for me, as the wines were so startlingly clear and focused. The last thing I wrote in my book after we tasted the final 2007 in barrel is this: "The thing with all of these is the clarity and precision of flavors."

It was instructive for me to compare the Pommard to the Pommard 1er cru. Both were fine wines, full of dark fruit, a bit smoky, a bit savage on the nose. The 1er Cru (a blend of fruit from Les Chanlins and Les Arvelets) was more mineral on the nose and the fruit was even darker, more muscled, layered and complex.

Philippe Pacalet, definitely a bit of a rascal.

I loved tasting through the progression of wines from Gevrey-Chambertin, experiencing the similarities and differences. The villages wine was seductive with an elegant melange of fruit and something like orange peel zestiness on the finish. This wine really set the tone for the wines that followed.

Bel Air is one of those vineyards that is bordered almost entirely by Grand Cru vineyards - it lives in a fancy neighborhood. On its eastern edge it borders Chambertin Clos de Beze, Ruchottes Chambertin and Mazis-Chambertin. On its western side lie some villages level parcels, also called Bel Air, and then trees. Pacelet's 1er Cru Bel Air was just lovely, with sappy red fruit, fresh figs, great acidity, and a savory orange peel element. Very bright and clean, there is a vibrant floral aftertaste. This was my favorite of the Gevrey 1er Crus.

1er Cru Perrieres (meaning little stones, I've been told) borders Clos Prieur and various villages lieu-dits. A road separates it from Mazis-Chambertin. The wine here was spicier, with darker fruit and a more muscular grip. Still, there was something similar to the previous two, and it was the orange peel sense on the finish. The 1er Cru Lavaux St Jacques was so different from the previous wines. Dark fruit, dark flowers, very mineral, a bit sweeter with caramel notes. This wine was moving in all directions - expansive and broad, and with finesse. This vineyard is on an entirely different hill on the northern Brochon side of Gevrey and it would be simple to pick it as the odd-wine-out if you were to taste them blind.

And then there was Charmes-Chambertin, the Grand Cru vineyard whose wines seem never to be as prized as those of Chambertin , Clos de Beze, or Ruchottes. I LOVED this wine, one of my absolute favorites of the entire trip. The nose was incredibly dense with spicy fruit, orange peel, minerals, elegant and powerful, and still somewhat closed, if you can believe that. Rich and deep on the palate, the wine spreads out and coats the mouth with gentle red fruit. There is great clarity here, balance, poise, richness, and a powerful core of fruit. I just hope that I can find a bottle of this someday when it's released.

The Ruchottes-Chambertin wasn't bad either. The nose was more savage and there were dried roses. The fruit was more brawny with animale hints on the finish. This one offered incredible length and complexity on the finish - I got mint, tar, roses, and orange peel. I can see why this might be considered the better wine, but I was more charmed by the Charmes, as might also be expected.

There were many more wines we tasted, from 2007 Chambolles, to the just born 2008's, some still bubbling a bit, to bottles from several recent vintages, to the Beaujolais Nouveau that reaches only the Japanese market. But it was the story of Gevrey-Chambertin that I will remember about my visit to Pacalet's cellar.

Dressner Portfolio Tasting Notes

So after the hard and wonderful work of the Terry Theise Portfolio tasting, we rushed over to the east side for Louis/Dressner tasting. There was simply no way to taste everything, even if this were the only tasting of the day. There were 250 wines, and I don't know about you, but I can't thoughtfully taste more than about 50 wines in one session.

I had to narrow the field, and so very sadly, I decided to taste mostly the new vintages of old and familiar wines. The Italian wines - I didn't taste 'em. Wines of the Savoie - didn't taste 'em. Burgundy, Jura, and Muscadet...nope.

Did I taste anything, you might be wondering, or did I just mingle with the wine stars? Oh, I tasted, buddy, and some great wine at that. I went for the Bubbles, the Beaujolais, the Cab Franc, and the Chenin Blanc. I had an hour - that's all I had time for.

First, I have to tell you about the 20 year table. In honor of their 20th anniversary, the Dressner folk dug into the cellar and set out a load of wines from their inaugural vintage. How thoughtful is that? And what a great opportunity for those of us (like me) who haven't tasted many of these wines with bottle age. I missed some of these wines, much to my dismay. Breton's Bourgueil Perrières, Chateau d'Oupia Cuvée les Barons, Pepière Clos des Briords...gone. And the Clos Rougeard Le Bourg - corked (but even so the fruit was young and lovely). The 1988 Closel Savennières Clos du Papillon was complex and beautiful, and the Chidaine Montlouis Clos Habert and the Pinon Vouvray Moelleux were great too. And as far as I know, 1988 wasn't a particularly great vintage - just a normal working class year in the Loire Valley. I'm more determined than ever to let my bottles sleep in peace...

Bubbles first, and what bubbles! Larmandier-Bernier wines are so different from the wide open style of much of the Theise portfolio. These wines are not generous, they are cautious and they'll hold back on you. There is nothing similar in style in the Theise portfolio except maybe Gimonnet, and those wines, if I may say so, do not have comparable depth or focus. These are piercing wines of great definition, and they can seem like turtles, just their head visible underneath all of that shell.

The Blanc de Blancs was opened as I was standing there and needed time to come together. But this bottle of Terre de Vertus showed better than any other I've tasted - richly fragrant with broad mineral flavors and ripe fruit. A memorable wine, and well worth the price (about $75). The 2004 Vieille Vignes de Cramant was focused and lovely with floral notes, although quite closed. There was no Rosé de Saignée left, which is tragic, as I have never tasted this legend of a wine.

Right near the Bubbly table sat two unattended bottles of Dard et Ribo white wine, both from 2006, a Crozes-Hermitage Blanc and a Saint-Joseph Blanc. I've never tasted a Dard et Ribo wine but I'd heard very good things, and these were better than very good. Fresh and pure with beautiful fruit and floral aromas, and great texture - voluptuous without that viscosity that find distracting in white Rhone wines.

Next was Beaujolais. This is such an impressive aspect of the Dressner portfolio. We're talking about many of the finest producers - Desvignes, Descombes, Brun, Tête, and Roilette, all at the same table. The wines that I liked the most on this day were the 2007 Clos de la Roilette Fleurie for its grace and purity of fruit, and the 2006 Desvignes Morgon Côte du Py for its depth and brambly intensity. There were many other excellent wines, but these are the two that I wanted to take those home with me.

The 2006's from Chidaine are quite good, although if you're used to the 2005's they will seem light. The 2006's are probably typical and the 2005's are probably extra rich and intense. My favorite was the 2006 Clos Habert, a demi-sec wine that I also love in 2005. The 2007 Pinon Vouvray Cuvee Silex Noir is just a great wine too, and a very good value at about $25. It was the temperamental 2006 Anjou Blanc from Agnès et René Mosse that I liked best of the current Chenin Blancs, with rich fruit on top of a pool of minerals, and a great underlying streak of acidity. At about $23, this is another excellent value. Rich enough to drink with a hangar steak, relaxed enough to enjoy with a bowl of vegetable soup.

I took a brief Burgundy excursion at this point and tasted through the Philippe Pacalet wines. Pacalet has a cellar in Beaune proper and buys grapes from various growers, often tending the plots himself. His wines are made in the classic style, focusing on purity, grace, and expression of terroir (read - not overly extracted and dark). Although these are not among my favorite red Burgundies, tasting Pacalet's 2006's was as fine a lesson in terroir of the Côte de Nuits as I've ever had. The Nuits-St-Georges was earthy and had wild game on the nose. The Pommard was muscular and dense, almost a bit clunky. The Gevrey-Chambertin was also muscular but with higher toned fruit. The Chambolle-Musigny was silky and more elegant. The Gevrey-Chambertin 1er Cru Perrieres (about $125) was in my opinion the finest of the lineup with great depth and intensity to compliment the ripe fruit and the firm structure. The Chambolle-Musigny was, as advertised, silky and more elegant.

And last for me were the great Loire reds, and what a way to end the day. I'm talking about Breton, Baudry, Raffault, Filliatreau, Clos Roches Blanches, and Clos Rougeard. I think the 2007 Baudry Les Granges is the best Les Granges since 2004. My first time tasting the 2006 Croix Boisée and I'm not sure where I stand. It had nice fruit, but it was so tannic and muddled that I couldn't decide whether or not I would buy it for myself. I need to taste this again. I was super impressed with how well the Raffault wines showed - all of them. The 2005 Chinon Les Picasses was ripe and expressive, but restrained and elegant too, and complex with herbal and earthy flavors. And under $25. The 2002 was a bit more awkward at this stage, but also shows elegance and balance to go along with the silky fruit. The 1990 was gone, but the 1989 was smooth and well balanced, and seemed quite youthful, nothing secondary about it.

All three Clos Rougeard wines were excellent - 2004 was an under appreciated year for red wine in the Loire, I think. Le Clos, the "entry level" wine, was ripe and delicious, and all elbows and knees right now. And by the way, this wine now costs about $60. Les Poyeux used to cost $50. These wines have become too expensive for most of us, sadly, as they represent some of the finest red Cabernet Franc wine from anywhere. Les Poyeux was delicious and oddly more accessible than Le Clos, and Le Bourg was your high school friend's huge but gentle older brother, more into math than football.

An amazing tasting that showcased the work that Louis/Dressner has done over the past 20 years to bring natural wines to the US. Next year if I am invited, I don't care if Barack Obama's white house tasting is the same day, I'm spending the day with Dressner.