Ten days ago, a bunch of us got together at one of Boston’s finest restaurants to taste through a range of 2001 Vosne Romanee 1er crus. Each person brought a bottle (or in some cases, two) and the wines were served blind--with our host at the restaurant organizing the flights for us.
We started out with a white Burg and then a blind Italian red that a local wine retailer had asked Blair to have the group evaluate for quality and price point perceptions.
2002 Louis Jadot Chassagne-Montrachet En Cailleret. Out of the gate, the bouquet of this wine reminds me of lemon drops, botanical herbs, powdered graphite, lime zest and those big puffy white mints that dissolve in your mouth. After a bit, it turns darker, with more of a focus on buttered rum and fine caramel notes. It is perhaps a bit advanced for its age, but it is nicely layered and attractively complex—a real pleasure to smell. In the mouth, it features a soft, luxuriant texture with plenty of body and glycerin, especially through the fanned out mid-palate. Cool flavors of citrus, apple, soft cream and chalk tend to offset all of that somewhat, lending a bit more of a reserved feel to the wine at times. Overall, it is drinking beautifully right now, but is showing some advanced age—so one would be well-advised to drink up and enjoy it now.
1996 Cantina Vignaioli Barbaresco Elvio Pertinace Vigneto Nervo. First off, the wine smells of dusty cherries, leather shoe laces, black raspberry fruit, tar oil and an odd volatile volcanic rock kind of thing. In the mouth, it is open-knit but oddly hollow through the mid-palate, waiting until the very back of the palate to let any flavor slip out. The acidity feels way too forward and the whole thing comes across as poorly-balanced to my palate. Big tannins eventually come in and shut the whole thing down. I was not really impressed and guessed this to be something like a $25 Nebbiolo from some satellite appellation in the Piedmont region. In reality, this is at least 5 years older and twice the price of what I guessed--and I can say pretty easily that I would take a pass on it. A few others, however, were more positive, so that conclusion was not unanimous.
We then moved on to the red Burgs, starting with a flight we knew were non-2001 Vosne-Romanee premier crus. At some point, we were informed that the three vintages were 1996, 1997 and 2000. Naturally, I guessed wrong on each of the three…
1997 Dominique Laurent Vosne-Romanee 1er Cru La Croix Rameau Serie Rare. The bouquet of this wine is delightful. It opens up with decidedly mysterious earth notes of mushroom stalks, sweaty saddle leather, fresh road tar and full-on spice box before a whole bunch of sexy luscious sweet red fruit notes of cranberries, dark cherries and crushed raspberries pop out and take it to another level. The whole thing is just very attractive, and if anything is even better when coming back to it several hours later at the end of the night. In the mouth, this is awfully silky-textured. It features concentrated but not at all heavy flavors of sweet berries and red cherries that could maybe use a few more years to fan out a bit, but this is still really pretty and features a classy streak of fine acidity that carries it along. The fruit turns warmer and more enveloping the longer one stays with it, folding in some caramel notes and bringing along sneaky, caressing tannins that stay out of the way for the most part. This was my WOTN.
2000 J. Confuron-Cotetidot Vosne-Romanee 1er Cru Les Suchots. The nose here is quite different, with a much less attractive focus on herbal aromas. Notes of whole stem inclusion, tomato leaf, grilled green pepper, dry earth, young leather and white pepper are up-front, with just a bit of dried cranberry fruit in the background. On the palate, it is a bit chewy at first, without a lot of nuance to it. It is fullish-bodied, rounded, and soft-textured, with an easy, generous flow to it. However, it is awfully spicy and it shows some heat on the finish right from the start and only gets more alcohol-tinged as time goes on. This had to be one of my least favorite wines of the tasting.
1996 Domaine Robert Arnoux Vosne-Romanee 1er Cru Les Chaumes. Aromas of black cherries, mulled spiced plums, mace and incense combine for a very fruity bouquet that sports some interesting background earth notes. It is totally seamless in the mouth, with a slippery feel that helps it slide effortlessly across the palate. The darker fruit feels rich and young despite the glossy smoothness of the texture. There is a spine of soft acidity and some dark chocolate-tinged tannins on the finish that supply structure and delineation. It finishes dry, but fully-fruited and long. There is a lot to like here, but it seems to fall just short of pulling it all together at this stage of its evolution.
We then moved on to the main theme of 2001 premier crus from Vosne-Romanee.
2001 Domaine Daniel Rion et Fils Vosne-Romanee 1er Cru Les Beaux-Monts. For me, this was the clear favorite among the 2001’s. It features a really gorgeous bouquet of purple flowers, rose water, wild brambly berries, forest greens and citrus peel that is soft, light and fresh. Later in the evening, some fine oak notes and a bit of jalapeno pepper and bacon fat fill in the bottom a bit more, giving it a complete feel. In the mouth, it features some soft chocolate notes and lots of bright berry freshness. The fruit can seem a bit young and raw at times, but the pillowy texture allied to a fine feeling of freshness keep this firing along with ease. There is some soft, gentle tannin in a supporting role, and it is easy to see that this is a wine that ought to just get better and better with some more mid-term cellar time. This was easily my #2 WOTN.
2001 Sylvain Cathiard Vosne-Romanee 1er Cru En Orveaux. This wine opens with some faintly musty notes, leading into purple and black fruits, but staying pretty mute for much of the evening. It is really only hours later, as the restaurant is closing down around us that this begins to open up and start showing more of its expressive side. In the mouth, it is a bit raw and devoid of much nuance, though it has plenty of body and fullness of fruit. It is tightly-coiled, with whatever charms it has hiding behind a wall of monolithic fruit and structure. It does have a pleasingly plush texture and a persistent personality, with tannins that are well in check. Again, though, later pours show a wine that is just beginning to move past this and start to show its colors. So, for anyone planning to drink this now, give it a lot more slow-ox time than we did or a healthy splash decant.
2001 Liger-Belair Vosne-Romanee 1er Cru Les Chaumes. The nose of this wine is a bit wooly at first, but does open up to more fruity aromas of boysenberry, raspberry and dark cranberry allied to some earth tones and tomato paste. It seems really young and a bit primal to me. It is pretty darned voluminous in the mouth, but not in any overly boisterous or over-done fashion. It is actually rather dry-edged throughout, but with that richer dark fruit really filling the middle. It manages to feel reserved through the back of the palate and on the finish. Overall, it seems like there are plenty of fine component pieces, but it needs a good while to integrate the parts and come together. Don’t touch for a good while.
2001 Louis Jadot Vosne-Romanee 1er Les Suchots. We did not know that we had duplicate wines until pretty late in the evening when Chris let us know. Once he did, it seemed pretty clear to me that this and the next wine were the ones that were the same. While several others claimed both of these bottles were flawed, I have to disagree. I think neither came across as particularly complex or deep (which one would reasonably expect), but they were far from flat or dead, which others who perhaps drank them much earlier in the evening claimed. For me, this particular bottle features aromas of gentle red strawberries, brown spices, caramel, citrus peel and soft limestone in a light, airy package. Over the course of the evening, it gains a bit in the glass, getting darker-fruited underneath and pulling in some funkier edging. It is finely acidic but decently mouth-filling, coming across overall as a lighter-styled easy-drinker with no real sense of depth or bass notes. From all who have weighed in on this, the consensus seems to be that the wine ought to show a lot more than this.
2001 Louis Jadot Vosne-Romanee 1er Les Suchots. This is a bit less giving on the nose than the previous wine, but is overall pretty similarly-profiled. In the mouth, it is perhaps a bit more lively and lifted than the previous wine, with a bit more in the way of tannic structure. Again, though, it is more of an easy-drinking wine, albeit with a bit more of a fun freshness to it than the other Jadot Suchots drunk alongside it.
2001 J. Confuron-Cotetidot Vosne-Romanee. Peter brought this village-level wine to throw into the mix as a comparison point with the premier crus. It provided some good entertainment, but no pleasure. I heard aromatic descriptors like “a vinyl record being pulled out of the sleeve for the first time”, “Corinthian leather upholstery with wedding soup spilled on it” and “new car deodorant sprayed into a crappy old car.” I didn’t get any of that, but can certainly agree that this smells artificial and industrial--with vinyl, glue and couch cushion foam aromas overwhelming the pomegranate, blood orange and green herb notes fighting to get through. In the mouth, it just doesn’t have the pedigree of the other wines and it seemed fairly clear to me that this must be the village wine. The acidity is austere and drying, the texture is chewy, the tannins are rough and the fruit is both under-ripe and chunky at the same time.
On the whole, other than the Rion, the 2001’s were a bit disappointing in terms of being in good places in their evolutions to enjoy now. It would be interesting to repeat this tasting in say 5 years and see what has happened by then.
We ended the evening with a nice Chenin Blanc that Karl was kind enough to bring.
1994 Foreau Vouvray Moelleux Clos Naudin. This is a bright orange and rust color. The nose seems slightly oxidative at first to me, with copper, asparagus and macerated strawberry aromas that are a bit funky. However, it soon begins to pull in much more enticing aromas of apricots, brown sugar, hard-spun caramel and green chili. On the palate, bitter and sweet elements fight it out all the way from entry to finish. Toasted orange rinds, smoky tangerines and orange pekoe tea notes are the sorts of flavors that come to my mind as I taste it. The wine is finely acidic and crisp, and really not all that sweet, showing more austerity around the edges than tangy sweetness.
-Michael