2006 Volnay Carelle Sous la Chapelle

The Boillot 2006 Volnay Carelle Sous La Chapelle – from 50 year old vines situated below the Clos de la Bousse d'Or and abutting Champans – smells of fresh plum and blackberry, toasted almonds, and bittersweet floral perfume. It evinces a distinct underlying sense of chalkiness on the palate that Boillot considers typical for this site, yet there is a quite polished tannic presence, and without any superficial sense of sweetness, this offers fine, sappy fruit persistence and encouraging lift. I suspect it will hold up well for at least the next 4-5 years. Jean-Marc Boillot started harvesting reds (which constitute nearly half of his acreage) on September 22, immediately after finishing (in a great hurry) with his whites; using all 60 pickers he had in place; and finishing in 72 hours. Already by that time, a significant share of fruit had to be culled out for rot, while another share was unripe, so the yields ended up a pathetic 18 hectoliters per hectare. He adapted his vinification to the material by trying to be even gentler than in 2005, albeit for a different reason. A regimen of 40-50% new wood was maintained from 2005, though, and while I cannot say that any wines were overtly woody, given the fragile fruit and coarse tannin structure of several in this collection, I have to wonder about the advisability of that approach. Importers: A Becky Wasserman Selection, Le Serbet; fax 011- 333-80-24-29-70 and Vineyard Brands, Birmingham, AL; tel. (205) 980-8802