2005 Gevrey Chambertin Les Cherbaudes

Tasted blind in Hong Kong, it had been several years since I last tasted the Gevrey-Chambertin 1er Cru les Cherbaudes from Jean-Marie Fourrier. There is a touch of struck match on the nose that is quite high-toned for Jean-Marie, the fruit much darker when juxtaposed against Rousseau's Clos Saint Jacques '02 (for example). The palate is medium-bodied with touches of orange peel and bell pepper infusing the black fruit. It is nicely balanced, although you feel that a couple more years in bottle will do this no harm at all. Very fine.

From the south of the village, this wine is rather paler and lighter on the palate with lots of jewel-like fruit. Racy but a lighter style of burgundy – for drinking with white meat? (JR)

From just below Mazis-Chambertin, the 1er cru 2005 Gevrey-Chambertin Les Cherbaudes features subtly caramelized and high-toned cherry and raspberry essences, vanilla, and flowers on the nose, refinement and polish as well as abundant fruit and subtle gaminess on the palate, and a long, billowing, perfumed persistence, which however never loses sight of an underlying roasted meatiness. Follow this for a dozen or more years. The articulate and opinionated Jean-Marie Fourrier staunchly believes in the inclusion of uncrushed fruit (to among other things prolong fermentation and, he claims, diminish the efficiency of alcoholic conversion); leaving the young wines on their lees (with high CO2 retention) eighteen months before bottling; employing a mere 20% of new barrels for all wines; and applying only minimal doses of sulfur. That the property from which he sources is all owned outright, and is largely in vines of over fifty years age planted by his father or grandfather before the days of clones certainly helps explain the consistently excellent quality at this address. Importer: Rosenthal Wine Merchant, Pine Plains, NY; tel. (800) 910-1990