Author: Thomas Wilcox

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Gorgeous New 2018 Premier Cru Red Burgundy: “Sleek” & “Subtle”

The wine writers’ notes on 2018 reds are full of qualified enthusiasm. The best are said to be ripe, rich, mouthfilling, bold, and delicious — Vinous’s Neal Martin found “a sense of nascent joie-de-vivre” across the vintage. But wines picked too late can be overripe — “very ripe wines of highly variable quality,” concluded Allen Meadows (Burghound).

In tasting over a hundred 2018 reds we found much to like, and were able to select for those that we felt matched structure to their fruit. One particular success was today’s cuvée, a premier cru Santenay from Roger Belland. Belland’s wines always tend towards fruit and accessibility, and we were a bit nervous they’d be pushovers — delicious young, but lacking structure.

We needn’t have worried — Belland managed to craft his 2018 reds into real successes, with terrific definition and depth.

Even amid a trend of warmer and earlier vintages, 2018 stands out: record breaking temperatures, an early budbreak, enormous yields and high sugar levels. Many winemakers drew comparisons to 2003, but credited a very wet winter with 2018’s much better balance — same heat, less drought.

Belland’s 2018 Santenay 1er cru Gravières carries more weight than usual, but it’s bolstered by beautiful minerality and firm structure. We were delighted with the mouthfeel of the wine — at once rich and ripe but long and tense. Burghound agreed, awarding 90 points, finding “poached plum, cassis, violet and plenty of earth,” and calling it “rich, supple” and “sleek.”

The 2018s may trend bolder than usual, but in the hands of a careful winemaker committed to balance, they’re no less Burgundian.

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Belland Santenay 1er “Gravières” 2018
bottle price: $42

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Juicy, Delicious, Teeth-Staining New Gamay. $18

Appellation: Chiroubles
Chiroubles may occupy the lightweight end of the Cru Beaujolais spectrum, but in a vintage as warm as 2019, that means it offers elusive balance. There’s nothing lightweight about today’s cuvée, which combines bright floral precision with inky, juicy gamay density.

Varietal: Gamay
Gamay produces wines with bursting fruit profiles — explosively floral bouquets and crunchy juicy mouthfeels. Today’s cuvée offers a richer take on the grape, but it’s no less jubilant or gulpable.

Vintage: 2019
The 2019 vintage was hot and dry in France, among the warmest in decades. The result was low yields, very ripe grapes, and intensely concentrated juice. Tasted blind, you might even guess today’s wine was Syrah.

Winemaker: Jean-Marc Monnet
To call Jean-Marc Monnet an “under-the-radar” winemaker would be understatement. He has no website, no road sign, no employees, and no other US importer. But his wines have won him acclaim in France, where the Guide Hachette named him a Winemaker of the Year” in 2017. His style is old-school Beaujolais, but with extra polish: no oak, exuberant fruit, gorgeous mouthfeels, and attractive prices.

Tasting Notes: 2019 Chiroubles
The nose shows intense perfume of violet, graphite, peony, earth, and wild cherries. But the unusually hot year produced an extraordinarily dense wine — the mouthfeel is punchy and vibrant, with bursting tannins and cool refreshing notes of cranberries and woods.

Pairing Suggestions
Monday: Burgers. Wednesday: Netflix. Sunday: Coq-au-Vin

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Monnet Chiroubles 2019
bottle price: $18

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Crisp, Autumn White Burgundy under $30

Burgundy is where Chardonnay finds its finest expression. In cold climates, the grape can be acidic and thin; in hot climates, it runs the risk of high alcohol and over extraction. But in Burgundy, Chardonnay has the potential to strike its most elegant balance between soft, mouthfilling fruit, and crisp, refreshing acidity.

Winemaker Vincent Ravaut deftly walks this balance between fullness and crispness in his white wines. The Ravaut family’s white Burgundies include some of the best we know, including an extraordinary, age-worthy Grand Cru Corton-Charlemagne. But today’s offer is for their simplest — a Bourgogne blanc that combines the golden texture of elegant Chardonnay with a vibrant line of freshness.

The Ravaut Family is a low-profile domaine in an often-forgotten town. They still sell a majority of their wine to loyal customers who visit their front door, and during our tastings their cellars are often crowded with visitors from Paris and elsewhere in France. The Ravauts fly mostly below the radar of the international wine press, and we feel lucky to have found them.

From France’s warmest vintage since 2003, the 2018 Ravaut Bourgogne Blanc offers smooth and ripe – an effortlessly drinkable glass of wine. The nose is expressive and attractive, showing pear and coconut, with a hint of lemon peel. The mouth is silky but lively, with notes of almond and toast balanced by green apple freshness. There’s more chalky length than you’d expect from a wine of this level.

This is a perfect house white Burgundy — lively and energetic, but full of rich smoothed fruit to coat the palate in style.

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Ravaut Bourgogne blanc 2018
bottle price: $28

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[ADVANCE ORDER] Bold, Vibrant New 2018 Michel Gros Bourgogne. $25

Our final Futures issue of the year comes out next week. It includes some of our most popular winemakers — Goubert, Boyer-Martenot, Desvignes, Bardoux and more — but one favorite in particular: the Domaine Michel Gros. His entire lineup of 2018s will be available next Sunday, but today we’re focusing on one wine that is always in short supply.

The 2018 vintage was a hot one across France, and in Burgundy it produced bold wines with broad shoulders and impressive density. The wines may be light on Burgundy’s signature elegance and precision, but they more than make up for it with gusto and pluck.

Great winemakers make excellent wines from even the humblest terroir. Gros is famous for his fine, high-end red Burgundies, and we can’t recommend them enough. But for everyday enjoyment, Gros’s simpler wines show the class of much fancier bottles.

Gros’s Bourgogne 2018 is bold, muscly and delicious. It’s richer than usual — lots of dark smoky fruit over present nicely integrated tannins. There’s far more complexity here than most reds at the Bourgogne level. Look for raspberry and plum, and an earthy, complex palate. Vinous found “bright red cherry, bilberry and light black olive” with “chalky tannins” and “vivid blueberry and strawberry fruit.”

We expect Gros’s 2018s to make lots of friends over the coming years. But this one, scheduled to arrive in late November, will be a treat by the holiday season. For a Burgundy lover, this is about as good a wine as $25 will ever buy. First come, first served until our allocation is used up.

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Michel Gros Bourgogne 2018
Ansonia Retail: $384
October Futures: $295/case

Email Tom to reserve a case



AVAILABLE BY THE CASE AND HALF-CASE

 

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Electric, Brilliant Dry Riesling under $20

Ask a group of sommeliers to name their favorite wine region and most will say Burgundy. But ask them for just one favorite grape varietal, and it’s likely Riesling. Aside from its excellent food friendliness, Riesling communicates terroir with as much honesty and precision as any other grape.

Today we’re suggesting a bone-dry Riesling from our Austrian source Weingut Salomon-Undhof. Based in Austria’s northeastern corner, the Salomon family has farmed vines since 1792, and the country’s preeminent wine guide calls them a “figurehead of Austrian wine history.”

Grüner Veltliner may be the classic grape from Austria (and indeed Salomon’s is excellent), but this electric, piercing dry Riesling is too good to put down.

The 2018 Terrassen Riesling is bright and dry and crisp. The nose shows green apple and notes of stones and grape skins. The mouth is zippy and refreshing, with pleasant dry fruit and excellent freshness.

An unusually warm summer across Europe in 2018 produced wines with an extra dose of ripeness. In Salomon’s Riesling Terrassen this translates into an added weight and complexity – still entirely dry, but with a creamy mid-palate filling. In short, a remarkable amount of poise for a wine under $20.

Serve with sushi, Thai cuisine, or lobster.

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Salomon-Undhof Riesling “Terrassen” 2018
bottle price: $19

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Bold, Woodsy, Superb 2018 Côte de Nuits-Villages

New winemakers in Burgundy are hard to come by. It’s a tiny region, and between small harvests, ever increasing demand, and well-established importers, it can seem there’s nothing new to discover.

But with a bit of research and a dash of persistence, we still manage to find hidden gems. One of last year’s most exciting finds was the Domaine Boursot, based in part on a recommendation from Vinous’s Burgundy reviewer Neal Martin. Martin writes of a “foundation for a promising future,” and describes Boursot’s wines as “superb,” “excellent,” “very fine,” and “worth seeking out.”

Boursot is best known for their excellent Chambolle-Musignys, which were met with wide acclaim among our readers last year. But their hidden gem is their Côte de Nuits-Villages.

Boursot’s Côte de Nuits-Villages is a supremely well-located regional-level wine, and the quality shows through in the glass. Made from vines immediately on the other side of the wall from Chambolle royalty Frédy Mugnier’s famous Nuits-St-Georges 1er cru “Clos de la Maréchale,” (see photo) this greatly overperforms its class.

The 2018 has just arrived, and it’s even better than the 2017. It’s classic Boursot style: the nose is dark and briary, with Côte de Nuits cassis and hints of black pepper and toast. The mouth is punchy and juicy, with a woodsy mouthfeel laid over lots of beefy extraction. The bottle we enjoyed last night with roast chicken was dark, smooth, and superb — a perfect cozy autumn match.

Is it as good as the $175 Premier Cru Nuit-St-Georges next door? Nope. But at a quarter of the price it might be a better buy — loaded with character, presence, and depth.

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Boursot Côte de Nuits-Villages 2018
bottle price: $42

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New Autumn Syrah: Dark, Delicate, Delightful

Syrah is at its finest in the Northern Rhône. Appellations such as Hermitage, Côte Rôtie, and Cornas produce transcendent expressions of the grape, combining darkly beautiful notes of blackberry and plum with spices, minerals, and savory umami notes.

These famous towns produce wines that are both ageworthy and expensive, but there’s plenty of excellent Northern Rhône Syrah that requires less patience and investment. Today’s wine is a Vin de Pays from a masterful Cornas source — a dark and delicate autumn red.

Dumien-Serrette is relatively new to the Ansonia portfolio, but hardly new to their hometown of Cornas — records show Dumiens living there in 1515. Their old-vine Cornas cuvées are magnificent, and not to be missed.

Dumien-Serrette’s 2019 Syrah “Moulin” is at once dark and lively. The nose shows deep, beautiful violets and earth, with classic Northern Rhône cloves and black pepper. The mouth is young, peppery, and vibrant, with juicy crushed berries, lavender, and granite.

Serve this in place of a Beaujolais, for something a little different.

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Dumien-Serrette Moulin “Syrah” 2019
bottle price: $29

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Vibrant, Biodynamic Dry Riesling. $22

To the uninitiated, Riesling is a cheap, insipid wine — rarely interesting, and never noble. But to those in the know, Riesling can be vibrant, dry, and extraordinarily well priced.

No white grape varietal communicates its origin as fluently. As writer Terry Theise puts it, “Riesling does more than just imply terroir: it subsumes its own identity as fruit into the greater meaning of soil, land, and place.”

The most recent addition to our Riesling collection is a dry cuvée from Domaine Gross, a small, biodynamic family source in Alsace. A perfectly dry, everyday white wine.

Vincent Gross is a young, enthusiastic winemaker practicing biodynamic viticulture, and producing truly exciting wines. With the retirement of Francis Muré, our longtime Alsatian source, our discovery of Gross couldn’t be timed more perfectly.

Gross’s 2018 Riesling is everything you want it to be. The nose is a gorgeous marriage of high-toned fruits and stony minerals. The mouth is dry and electric — notes of grapefruit, lemon peel, apples and pears.

With everyone cooking at home these days, this is as useful as a good sharp kitchen knife. Pair this on its own, with fish dishes, or with a classic tarte flambé (Alsatian Pizza). You’ll find yourself wishing all $19 wines were this good.

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Gross Riesling 2018
bottle price: $22

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Rich, Teeth-Staining New Juliénas from 100-year-old Vines. $24

Beaujolais is the source of plenty of uninteresting wines. Fully a third of the region’s production is the Beaujolais Nouveau, a cheap insipid red rushed to market a month after harvest. But the rest of the region contains many highly undervalued wines, some in the same class of top wines from the north of Burgundy.

No Beaujolais source has more impressed us than Laurent Perrachon. From meticulously cultivated old vines and careful use of oak, Perrachon creates remarkably delicious and refined red Burgundies. We’re not the only ones to notice; the domaine is among the only Beaujolais producers reviewed (and praised) by both Josh Raynolds (Vinous) and Allen Meadows (Burghound).

These are honest, complex, delicious red Burgundies; they just happen to be made from Gamay.

Perrachon’s 2018 Juliénas “Vignes Centenaires” is a startlingly good value. It’s pure Gamay, dense and inky, drawing from vines planted over a century ago. Perfectly extracted and carefully aged in oak barrels, this wine shows a beautifully dark, brooding nose of anise and blackberries. The tannins are juicy and silky and bursting with fruit; look for dark chocolate and raspberry jam in the mouth.

This has more stuffing and character than many $30 Pinots you’d find from an hour north. The 2018 vintage produced an abundance of very ripe fruit, and this wine bursts with flavor and texture. The tannins are present, but not nearly as young as we’d expected: a perfect autumn red. At under $5/glass, this is a perfect match for your Thanksgiving table — though we caution a case may not last you til November.

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Perrachon Juliénas “Centenaires” 2018
bottle price: $24

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Gorgeous, Intense, Floral Châteauneuf-du-Pape. $34

The 2017 vintage was an unusual one in the Southern Rhône. Most reds here rely on Grenache for a majority (or at least plurality) of their blend, but in 2017 Grenache vines across the region had a bad Spring flowering, and yields were down dramatically.

This set the stage for other grapes to shine, and at Christophe Mestre’s domaine in Châteauneuf-du-Pape, the understudy Syrah performed beautifully. Mestre’s cuvée usually features 75% Grenache, with Syrah somewhere around 10%. The 2017 features equal parts Grenache and Syrah (30% each) with Mourvèdre (25%) and Cinsault (15%) making up the rest.

The 2017 Mestre may be atypical, but it’s also flat out delicious. We bought it last fall and sold out earlier this year — when we saw it still on the price list we decided to re-up.

Christophe Mestre continues to turn out delicious Châteauneuf du Pape at unusually good prices. He avoids heavy oaking and luxury cuvées, preferring an old school, uncomplicated style of wine. He makes a single red cuvée, and keeps his pricing astonishingly reasonable. Beaucastel this isn’t, but we think it vastly overperforms its $34 price tag.

His 2017 Châteauneuf-du-Pape won a gold medal at the Concours d’Orange, and it’s easy to see why. The wine offers a gorgeous floral nose, with Syrah’s violets front and center. The Syrah contributes structure as well, which means that this wine should stay textured a bit longer than his other Grenache-heavy cuvées. There’s really good complexity and a touch of tar and earth to go with the deep, dark fruit. Serve this all fall and winter as the weather turns cold.

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Mestre Châteauneuf-du-Pape 2017
bottle price: $34

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Juicy, “Succulent” 2018 Red Burgundy under $40

Maranges is the Côte d’Or’s forgotten appellation. In the past it was known for its unrefined, tannic wines — Burgundians used to call it “le medecin” (the doctor) because some secretly blended it into thinner Côte d’Or reds to bulk up weak vintages.

But today its reputation needs revision. Advances in winemaking and warmer summers mean that Maranges now produces wines of real character and complexity. They never reach the depth or elegance of reds from Volnay or Pommard, but they offer early enjoyment and pleasant, hearty textures. And Roger Belland’s Maranges 1er cru “Clos Roussot” 2018 is the best Maranges we’ve ever had.

Belland’s 2018 Maranges is, of course, pure Pinot Noir, but it borrows a bit of the nearby Beaujolais’s jubilant spirit — think red Burgundy with the soul of a Cru Beaujolais. The 2018 vintage delivered unprecedented heat and sun in Burgundy, and the resulting wines are full of both ripeness and muscle.

This wine has just arrived, and it’s as good as we found the sample back in June. The nose is cool and dark, with plum and spice in the nose; the mouth is dark, intense, and full, with punchy young tannins and lots of stuffing.

Don’t let the “where’s-that-again?” appellation fool you — this is real, characterful red Burgundy at an attractive price.

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Belland Maranges 1er “Clos Roussots” 2018
bottle price: $38

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Golden 2018 White Burgundy under $30

White Burgundy is among the best food-pairing wines around. It works at the high end – an ageworthy Meursault, a rich dish of veal in cream, etc. But it answers the call for something uncomplicated and reliable — a hearty bowl of mussels, chicken thighs on the grill.

Gerard Thomas’s Bourgogne blanc has been our go-to white burgundy for nearly a decade now. The 2018 is everything you want in a Bourgogne blanc: refreshing, complex, rich but not heavy, vibrant but not thin. It doesn’t make Meursault promises — but it way over delivers for $6/glass.

All of Gérard Thomas’s 2018s are lipsmakingly good — a tasty combination of fleshy texture and shimmering energy. At each classification level the wines drink above their weight. The 2018 Bourgogne has a bit more meat on its bones than usual, making it lovely on its own.

We usually only get one allocation of this wine every year, but the unusual market this spring meant there was a bit left over. We sold out back in June, but are thrilled to have it back in stock — at least for the moment.

The nose is soft and elegant, with hazelnut and wood notes melting into lemon and baked apple fruit. There’s solid acidity and plenty of body, and it’s more mouthfilling than most wine of its class. For a busy weeknight when all you need is something balanced and crisp and refreshing, here’s an unusually polished option.

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Thomas Bourgogne 2018
bottle price: $29

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Beaujolais Arrives! Juicy, Gulpable New 2019 Juliénas. $18

It’s starting to feel like Fall again — football is back, there’s a chill in the air, and pumpkins are popping up at the market. Chez nous, the change in seasons means a change in our wine habits — a shift towards bottles that are richer, redder, and more robust. But most importantly, autumn means Beaujolais.

The celebration around the Beaujolais Nouveau (if not the wine itself) may be enjoyable, but it sells the grape and terroir short. Given a few extra bucks, one more year, and a bit of care in the vines and cellar, Gamay can be worlds better than mass-market infantile Nouveau.

For proof, look no further than Jean-Marc Monnet, our source in Juliénas.

Jean-Marc Monnet has no website, no other American importer, and even we still get lost trying to find his house sometimes. We used to think of him as our little secret, but it turns out the Guide Hachette named him a Winemaker of the Year two years ago. His three 2019 cuvées have just arrived, and they’re as good as ever.

Monnet’s Juliénas still embodies the ebullient essence of the Beaujolais — just with a lot more class. The 2019 bursts with juicy, inky fruit — look for cranberry, wild cherry, and plum in the nose. The mouthfeel is intense and smooth with a long, dense finish of graphite and violets. It’s best described in French as gouleyant, a wonderfully onomatopoeic word that means “gulpable.” Try it — “GOO-lay-AWNT” — it’s almost as fun to say as this is to drink.

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Monnet Juliénas 2019
bottle price: $18

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“Highly Seductive” 2015 Red Burgundy, a Clos de Tart Neighbor

The Clos de Tart is one of Burgundy’s iconic vineyards properties. The vineyard has had only four owners since the 12th century, and, unusually for Burgundy, has never been subdivided. Today the wines from this 7.5 hectare monopole start around $500 per bottle.

We don’t open Clos de Tart all that often. But we do enjoy wine from its immediate neighbor, a premier cru across the street called “Les Ruchots” — most consider it the finest premier cru in the town. Our source in Morey-St-Denis, the Domaine Pierre Amiot, makes magnificent Ruchots year in and year out. Today we’re excited to offer their terrific 2015.

From an acre of vines, the Amiot family makes just 200 cases of this wine per year. Their vines, planted in the 1950s, produce concentrated, intense red Burgundy. Allen Meadows (Burghound) awarded the 2015 92 points, finding it “suave and velvety,” “highly seductive,” and with “very fine persistence.” Now five years on from the harvest, this 2015 has begun to add gorgeous woodsy notes like licorice and mushroom.

We’re not claiming you’ll mistake Ruchots for its famous Grand Cru neighbor, but it’s easy to see why many consider Ruchots the best premier cru in the town. It’s a wine of unusual depth and intensity for its class, and at less than a sixth the cost, we think it’s a fantastic value.

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Amiot Morey-St-Denis 1er “Ruchots” 2015
bottle price: $86

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Back in Stock: Crisp Refreshing $25 Sancerre

Grape: Sauvignon Blanc
Sauvignon blanc is among the world’s most widely planted grapes, but its origin is the Loire Valley. In the Loire, Sauvignon takes on a floral, mineral style, juicy grapefruit notes with a lively minerality, often notes of flint, and pleasant herbal finish.

Appellation: Sancerre
Wine writer Lettie Teague once described Sancerre as a wine about “pleasure not profundity.” Located at the eastern end of the Loire, Sancerre produces consistently delicious wines — approachable, affordable, and uncomplicated.

Wine: Garenne Sancerre 2019
At a perfect $5/glass, this wine has become hard to keep in stock — we’ve just reupped (again). Garenne’s 2019 Sancerre is easy and delightful. It’s bone-dry with pure sauvignon grapefruit in the nose. In the mouth it’s lively but with no astringency or grassiness — a warm vintage gave added weight but no less freshness. Look for minerals and lime in the mouth alongside the ripe fruit.

Pairing: Moules Frites
A classic autumn bistro paring, serve this with mussels and fries — a simple broth of shallots, wine, parsley, garlic and tarragon. The fries will soak up the broth, and you’ll soak up the taste of fall.

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Garenne Sancerre 2019
bottle price: $25

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