2011 Chablis Vaudesir

The Billaud-Simon 2011 Chablis Vaudesir represents the inaugural treatment of this cru to the same barrel regimen as the Blanchots. The effect is – unsurprisingly, and to my mind regrettably – similar. There is a sense of chalkiness as well as grip and invigoration from citrus rind, but an overarching aura of wood resin masks any potentially finer points and above all robs the finish of primary juiciness, instead underscoring the inherently bitter side of the wine and coarsening a not inconsiderable mineral impact of chalk, fusil oils and smoke. I won’t attempt to handicap this wine’s evolution other than to express some skepticism about the value of cellaring it and telling any who do to be on guard. When I last visited Bernard Billaud on a June day for my issue 191 report focusing on vintage 2008, he agreed for the first time to show me his young grand crus in advance of bottling and alongside the premier crus that I was used to tasting at that season of the year. Unfortunately, he made emphatically clear on this most recent occasion that such would not be the case; indeed, I was not offered any of the 2012s to taste, but instead the full 2011 collection, and a report on Billaud-Simon’s 2012 will have to wait for next year, before which, in any case, they will not have been put on the market. (In keeping with existing conventions at The Wine Advocate – and seeing that there are modes of vinification in common and only one overlap in cru designations – I have not indicated as part of each wine’s description whether or not it relies entirely on domaine as opposed to contract fruit.) Imported by Langdon Shiverick, Los Angeles, CA; tel. (213) 483-5900

(vinified in wood for the first time, including a bit of new oak): Good bright, pale yellow with green highlights. Aromas of white and yellow peach, wet stone, smoky minerals and vanilla. Comes across as less obviously oaky than the Blanchots Vieilles Vignes, showing a distinctly brisk and penetrating character to its peach and caramel flavors. This youthfully imploded wine boasts very good cut but today the bright acidity has not yet harmonized with the wood component. Bernard Billaud made the change to vinification in oak because he always found this wine hard at the outset and slow to evolve; he felt that, done in wood, it would be less austere early on and would be drinkable in five or six years. This wine is showing much more energy than a sample I tasted last spring from barrel but calls for several years of patience.

Oily/mineral aroma. Not that intense on the palate though there's a fresh/sour persistence. A bit pricey for the quality. (JH)