2002 Burgundy Session

[TheEngineer]

I was in SF so a bunch of friends invited me over to their place. In the course of planning this, we decided to have a 2002 burgundy session to see where the wines were. This was an interesting nice with a bunch of enthusiasts.

(1) Michel Lafarge Bourgogne Aligote, Raisins Dores: faulty bottle. too bad as this is one of my favourite under $15 burgs.

(2) Laboure-Roi Chassagne-Montrachet: On, first opening, really nice, tight, delineated, citrus, lemon rind, and a tight mineral finish that lasted and lasted but with the high acidity, remained very fresh.

(3) Louis Jadot Savigny-Les-Beaune, La Dominode: The cheap and cheery wine of the evening, fruit, soft, pleasant nose, and a palate of ripe red/dark berries, oak, and a solid tannic and acidity structure behind it. Drinking really well now and I would not hesitate to drain the rest of mine.

(4) ’02 Mommessin Burgundy Beaune 1er: this wine was unfortunately faulty. There was a funky nose that never blew off, but you could sense that behind it there was a bit of strength of fruit and structure and a silkiness to the texture. Unfortunate.

(5) Comte Armand, 1er Cru Pommard Clos Des Epeneaux
This wine was like a magic show all night. Every time we returned to it, it showed differently. On opening, lush full, ripe tannic and smooth, after one hour, better nose, fully breadth of flavours, tannins at side line, after another hour, tightened up entirely, showing nothing but austere wood and tannings, then another 30 minutes showed it opening up again...... Though I love this wine. This one won't be touched again for another few years.

(6) Domaine Forey Pere et Fils Vosne-Romanee: Solid stately nose, not as flamboyant as the later Gevery Chambertain, but more so than the Pommard. Good body, nice structure. Apeared to be very tight and much waiting to be released. Decanted but I never tried it again.

(7) Vincent Girardin, Gevery Chambertain. This was the WOTH. What a great complex nose. The nose alone was worth the price of entry. Initally bacon fat, brown sugar, with a background of ripe red fruits, then layering on top again, tobacco, minerals and then revealing the fruit slightly reserved again. The wine was equally good, with a strong structure behind it, great berries, elegant body, slightly lithe in texture but dense in flavours, retaining th elegance of the body. Very nice and still got some time before trying again.

(8) 2001 Mesmer Spatburgunder Weissherbst. This was the sweet german Pinot Noir Auslese. Unfortunately faulty bottle? or jsut in dumb phase. Just flabby and cloy at this point in time.

(9) Ringer - 2002 The Walther Hansel South Slope which I like and pulled to see the different. while in itself a very good bottle, Good mouthfeel, nice density, solid bottle but just not special and it lacked the nose of the others. Unfortunately with this batch of wines that focused on finesse, this one didn't really have much of a chance.

[This message has been edited by TheEngineer (edited 03-16-2008).]

[winoweenie]

Nice notes there Eng and the amount of bad Vs. good stuff is the reason I quit buying Burgs lo them meeny years ago. WW

[wondersofwine]

Enjoyed your notes. Did you see my posting on the Louis Jadot dinner under "Wine Events" thread? We had the 2004 Savigny "La Dominode" and I ended up preferring it to a Beaune 1er Cru although not enough to purchase the 2006 on futures.
What region is the Walther Hansel?

[TheEngineer]

WOW, I did see your note and I think that my version performed well because of the vintage. It really was just a cheap and cheery wine, but I can imagine it not performing well enough in any particular vintage to warrant purchasing over something else for the same money.

As for the Walter Hansel, it was Russian River Valley.