2012 Chapelle Chambertin

(60% vendange entier): Good bright red. Wild, expressive aromas of black cherry, game and minerals. Sappy and fresh in the mouth, showing captivating inner-mouth energy to the flavors of raspberry, cranberry, redcurrant, menthol and flowers. Really lovely fruit here, as well as a medicinal reserve that promises more to come. Finishes with firm, building tannins and excellent length. All of these wines are still a bit hardened by a small sulfur addition a week or two prior to my visit.

The Chapelle Chambertin Grand Cru boasts stunning depth and richness. Trapet used 70% whole clusters, all of which are impeccably balanced and integrated. Dark red cherry, plum, smoke, licorice and savory herbs are some of the many notes that shape the voluptuous finish. The balance of fruit, acidity and structure is compelling, but the Chapelle is a wine for the cellar, so patience is going to be a virtue.

The 2012 Chapelle-Chambertin Grand Cru comes from one 0.65-hectare parcel from vines planted in 1938 planted by Louis Trapet, the other planted in 1965. It has a stony, earthy, introspective bouquet that is extremely defined, but will patently require several years in bottle. The palate is medium-bodied with crisp, tensile tannins with piercing acidity and a riveting chalky texture that electrifies the senses. This is very natural, very terroir driven – intellectual as much as a sensory proposition. I have tasted the wines of this domaine for many years in London and they never quite pricked the soul like others were able to. Trapet and I – we just never made a connection. So it was time to rap on their door on the RN74 in Gevrey-Chambertin and taste directly from barrel with winemaker Jean-Louis Trapet, cousin of the Rossignol brothers over the crossroads at Domaine Rossignol-Trapet. He is an easy-going gentleman, mild mannered and softly spoken, just a little grizzled, a spiritual person that has embraced biodynamie, certified not once but twice courtesy of Demeter and Biodyvin. Naturally, I started by asking him how his vines had coped during the capricious growing season of 2012. “I feel that biodynamics helped us to have stronger vines. We had a long season that began early. During flowering it was cold – I had never seen that since 1990 when I took over. Due to this difficult flowering we had very small bunches. That is the most important point of this vintage - lots of millerandage. We started picking on 25 September. The berries were very small but ripe. We usually use between 30% and 50% whole cluster, but this year we used between 50% and 90%. You could really see the difference in the vat: there was 30 to 40% more volume using whole bunches. I think it gives elegance and structure to the wines.” As previously mentioned, I must confess that whenever I encountered the wines in London, they did not quite deliver. Perhaps these sensitive biodynamic “souls” did not travel well? Certainly here I understood the wines better and I feel that they were more representative. There was more energy, more cohesion and tension here in the cellar. I was very impressed by the trio of grand crus that were amongst the best that I tasted during my trip (and given this was my final day, I had tasted many.) There is an intellectual aspect to Trapet’s wines. They are not hedonistic delights. They are not “polished” to appease the masses. They are natural, perhaps uncompromising wines that deserve reflection and thought, before delighting in their sensory pleasure. Importer: various including: Polaner Selections, Mt. Kisco, NY; tel. (914) 244-0404; Stacole Fine Wines, Boca Raton, FL; tel. (561) 998-0029; A Patrick Lesec Selection (various importers), Paris Fax 011 33 4 66 37 67 23 and Corney & Barrow (UK)