2004 Le Montrachet
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Tasting notes
Peach and apricot nectar, clove, iodine and marzipan on the nose. Huge, tactile and virile, with a saline character and penetrating minerality. No easy sweetness here! Colin notes that this is from the more elegant and less exotic Puligny side of the appellation, but the wine offers an uncanny impression of solidity. Finishes with great building length and classic dryness. I suspect a wine like this would resist oxidation for days in an open bottle.
Critic scores
Average Score
Neal Martin
Stephen Tanzer, Vinous
More reviews and scores
At two decades of age, the 2004 Montrachet Grand Cru has a reticent nose at first, typical of many whites that season. It unfurls with red apples, hints of lanolin and dandelion, a little crushed stone in the background, though to be brutally honest, it never quite clicks into fifth gear like many of Pierre-Yves’ wines are prone to do. The palate is more impressive and demonstrates the width and depth one expects from this illustrious Grand Cru. Given the season in question, the 2004 does not quite deliver the complexity of the best vintages that I have encountered, and it’s a tad “curtailed” on the finish. Yet, like all great terroirs, the Montrachet responds to aeration in the glass, touches of chamomile and almond emerging almost timidly with time, so that after 20 or 30 minutes, you are smitten. Sure, it is a lovely Montrachet, though one that I feel has been surpassed by subsequent vintages.
About the producer
Pierre-Yves Colin-Morey (known by many as PYCM) is a négociant and domaine that has become one of the most popular white wine producers in Burgundy – with a prolific number of cuvées from the top Grands and Premiers Crus vineyards in the Côte de Beaune.