2002 Chablis Valmur
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Tasting notes
(opened from personal storage). This has just reached the front end of maturity with still fresh and extremely elegant aromas that offer plenty of Chablis character while leading to ripe, detailed and wonderfully balanced flavors of fine intensity that are underpinned by a solid, indeed bracing lemon-infused acidity and a now only mildly austere, dusty and dry finish. There is real volume to the flavors and finish plus the overall harmony to age gracefully for years to come though there is no further upside development to be had. Tasted multiple times with consistent notes save for the most recent bottle that displayed an almost invisible hint of butterscotch on the nose but not on the palate. Still, if you're sensitive to pre-mox, it was enough to detract from the overall enjoyment. Sadly however this most recent bottle was completely premoxed and not even remotely drinkable.
Critic scores
Average Score
Stephen Tanzer, Vinous
Stephen Tanzer, Vinous
More reviews and scores
Good pale color. A great expression of grand cru soil on the nose: lime, chalk, iodine, mint, toast, smoke, wet stone, mineral salts and honey. Wonderfully rich and lush on the palate, with deep stone, floral and honey flavors given shape and grip by strong acidity. A wine of great texture, purity and persistence, revealing powerful extract on the back end. And a relative value for white Burgundy, as are all of these 2002s: Hervet notes that this is less expensive than Bouchard's Meursault Boucheres, one of that village's lesser premier crus.
The creamed mineral-scented 2002 Chablis Valmur (domaine) is a light to medium-bodied, feminine wine. Its crystalline character offers flint and seashell flavors that linger in its lengthy finish. This silky-textured, highly focused effort is a candidate for drinking between 2006 and 2012. While Bernard Hervet, who oversees both Bouchard and William Fevre, prefers the 2000 vintage in Chablis “for its minerality and austerity,” your author believes 2002 is the finest set of wines to have been produced at this estate/negociant firm in many years. Importer: Clicquot, Inc., New York, NY; tel (212) 888-7575
(with the Vaudesir, this holding produced the lowest crop level in 2002 at just 35 hectoliters per hectare) Extraordinarily perfumed, complex aromas of pineapple, lime, spices and wet stone; a real mineral bath on the nose, with great lift. Then thick, layered and huge; almost too large for the mouth. An incredibly smooth mouthful of liquid minerals; it's hard to get this stuff off the palate. This is now in stainless steel, where it will remain on its fine lees until February or March. Hervet believes that this wine will shut down in bottle and require several years of patience. Only the Clos is higher in acidity in 2002.
About the producer
Established in the late 1950s, William Fèvre was one of the leaders in Chablis’s renaissance. Today he crafts benchmark expressions of fine Chardonnay from some of the top vineyard sites in the region, working with many of the best Premier and Grand Cru vineyards.