WTN: 2000 Daniel Rion Clos de Vougeot

Seemed like a steal at $49 (Crush Wine Co.). Not lofty but decent vintage, supposedly drinking well now.

Cork in good shape. Strange initial odors from the bottle, metallic and lemony, soon dissipate and make way for mature red fruit and a slightly confusing note of cedar (that I habitually associate with left bank Bordeaux). Not intense.

First tasted minutes after opening (did not allow this to sit open for two hours, as I usually do). Classic brownish raspberry color. Strong burst of acidity in the mouth, overwhelming the fruit. Light and elegant tannins underneath. Some olive taste lingers in the mouth. Disappointment sets in.

Dinner is served: orecchiette with sausage and broccoli rabe. Becomes a very different wine as the food tames the acid. Fruit comes through more clearly, with some delicacy and complexity, with additional notes of tar, oak vanilla, and violets. After an hour, I conclude this lacks muscle and body for a grand cru, an absence insufficiently compensated in the subtlety department. For a mature grand cru, the deal seemed too good to be true, and I guess it was.

During my trip to Burgundy this February, I noticed how comparatively vast Clos de Vougeot is, with varying terrains, some right next to Musigny, some right by the road. Burgundy terroir seems so changeable, meter by meter, that quality within Clos de Vougeot must vary considerably.

CdV is probably the GC most notorious for variability. Upper slope CdV can be very very good, most lower slope CdV maybe doesn't deserve GC status.

[Jenise]

Dinner is served: orecchiette with sausage and broccoli rabe. Becomes a very different wine as the food tames the acid. Fruit comes through more clearly, with some delicacy and complexity, with additional notes of tar, oak vanilla, and violets. After an hour, I conclude this lacks muscle and body for a grand cru, an absence insufficiently compensated in the subtlety department. For a mature grand cru, the deal seemed too good to be true, and I guess it was.

Sorry to hear; I opened your note hoping to relive some of the stunning Rion CV's I've had. I'm struggling to recall vintages, but it was some time ago, and two of the late 80's vintages, a 90 and a 93 that we slaughtered too young at a dinner at Trouquet in Costa Mesa, CA. Don't blame you for being hopeful at $49.

Oswaldo,

The 1996 Jean Raphet CdV was excellent. I do not have a great deal of experience with CdV and was warned that the quality could be quite variable. We apparently got lucky with that one. My experience is that "luck" seems to play a role across most Burg producers, vineyards, and classifications.

It's worse with Clos de Vougeot. The original Cistercian monastic vineyard spanned the whole hillside, from top to bottom.

The top part abuts the other grands crus of the vicinity and fully merits its grand cru status. The middle part has premiers crus on either side of it and not surprisingly produces wine of that status. The very bottom, flat part has vineyards on the opposite side of the wall that don't even merit commune appellation status. Terroir doesn't recognize man-made walls.

The idiots who set up the classification system unfortunately chose to treat the whole original walled monastic vineyard as a single grand cru appellation, even though at best 1/4 of the land deserves that high a rating.

To make matters worse, there are something like 70 independent growers who own or lease plots in CdV. It makes quality control for the appellation impossible.

Even more than elsewhere in Burgundy, with Clos de Vougeot the producer's name is your only guide to quality. There are some really great wines produced there. And a lot of wines that give CdV a bad name.

-Paul W.