2010 Gevrey Chambertin En Champs

The 2010 Gevrey-Chambertin En Champs comes across as sleek and polished. Dark red cherries, flowers and mint are some of the notes that emerge from this textured, deep Gevrey. This is a decidedly big wine next to the other Gevreys and is one of the very few wines where the new oak (60%) is felt. This parcel of 70-year-old vines is on the Brochon border.

(60% new oak): Good bright, full red. Cherry, redcurrant, raspberry, flowers and spicy oak on the nose; smells taut. Then tight, savory and floral on the palate but a bit ungiving and imploded. Finishes with substantial building tannins. Very closed now but built to age. Mortet owns a full hectare of vines here, with five different parcels, and makes this cuvee from the best grapes each year, which do not necessarily come from the same vines.

The 2010 Gevrey-Chambertin En Champs comes across as sleek and polished. Dark red cherries, flowers and mint are some of the notes that emerge from this textured, deep Gevrey. This is a decidedly big wine next to the other Gevreys and is one of the very few wines where the new oak (60%) is felt. This parcel of 70- year-old vines is on the Brochon border. Anticipated maturity: 2017-2029. Arnaud Mortet is focused on making elegant, refined wines. In 2010 he sought to achieve that through gentle extraction and less use of new oak barrels, which is broadly the direction his winemaking is headed, notwithstanding the many particulars that present themselves each year. Mortet planned to age the 2010s fifteen months in barrel, then rack the wines into steel. Yields are of course down across the board, but that won’t be much of a surprise to readers given the vintage. Overall, the Mortet 2010s are striking for their beauty and transparency. The 2009 also showed brilliantly from bottle. I will report on those wines in the April issue. Importer: Martine’s Wines, Novato, CA; tel. (415) 883-0400