2010 Chablis Butteaux
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Tasting notes
I ordered a bottle of the 2010 Chablis 1er Cru les Butteaux at the impeccable Au Fil du Zinc restaurant in Chablis and immediately grabbed my pen to scribble a tasting note. This is such a scintillating Chablis, one that encapsulates everything great about the 2010 vintage. The nose is mineral through and through--imagine getting down on your hands and knees and just inhaling limestone after a shower. The palate continues that tensile, mineral-driven theme. It is incredibly tense, perhaps benefiting from a slight, but pleasant reduction towards the finish, with awesome length and precision. What a fantastic Butteaux from Domaine Raveneau.
Critic scores
Average Score
Antonio Galloni, Vinous
Stephen Tanzer, Vinous
More reviews and scores
Raveneau's 2010 Chablis Butteaux is beautifully expressive on the bouquet, where layers of petrol, smoke and melted rocks fuse together with notable elegance. The Butteaux is a wine of all dimensions; it is at once vertical and horizontal, with fabulous purity and exceptional overall balance. This is one of the larger-scaled 2010s here. In many ways it encapsulates the personality of the vintage.
Pale yellow. Reticent nose hints at musky peach and lime. Brisk, tight and rather uncompromising today, conveying an impression of strong acidity and youthful tannins. The slightly phenolic citrussy finish is subtle, serious and long. This distinctly backward wine calls for a good six or seven years of cellaring. (The Raveneaus' 2010 Montee de Tonnerre, Blanchots, Valmur and Clos, which I already reported on from barrel last year, were set to be bottled a week after my visit. Retastes of those wines underscored their high quality and captivating sucrosite; my scores were within the ranges I published in Issue 157: 92-94, 92-94, 93-95 and 94-96, respectively. The Valmur and Clos were knockouts again, with the former wine less powerful but perhaps more classic Chablis, and the flamboyantly silky and expressive Clos showing the musky peach and spice richness of a top Puligny-Montrachet wine. None of these cuvees were particularly austere.)
The 2010 Chablis Butteaux starts off rather slow and linear, but continues to build through the mid-palate before reaching an explosive climax on the finish. It remains a cool, tightly wound wine with layers of fruit that need time before they blossom. This is a terrific showing from the Butteaux.