2012 Chablis Vaillons Vieilles Vignes Les Minots

Freshly cut flowers, nectarine, spices, almonds and honey burst from the glass in the 2012 Chablis Vaillons Vieilles Vignes. Today the 2012 stands out for its pure energy and a sense of unrestrained wildness that is nevertheless hugely appealing. The Vieilles Vignes was vinified and aged in oak. At the time of this tasting, Dauvissat planned to move the wine into steel for its second year of aging.

Tasted from tank prior to its usual sojourn in older barriques, Sebastien Dauvissat’s 2012 Chablis Vaillons Vieilles Vignes – sourced, more specifically, from the cru Chatains – evinces bright lemon and chalk in the nose that reemerge on a silken palate mingled with nut oils and liquid evocations of iris perfume. Zesty and chalky impingements add to the stimulation of a sustained finish. Look for this polished, buoyant and complex cuvee to satisfy through at least 2024. Sebastien Dauvissat expresses his delight that the 2012s have emerged with a fine sense of equilibrium, considering how imbalanced and vine-stressing the weather was, with its dry and, at times, downright hot August flanked by periods of coolness and rain. Overall, the results remind him of 2002 – high praise in my book – with, he opines, a combination of early appeal with age-worthiness. The highest finished alcohol – which was also natural – in this 2012 collection was a mere 12.7%, and Dauvissat’s 2011s are even lower, with just a few lots having been lightly chaptalized. This estate practices very long elevage: its generic A.O.C. 2011 Chablis was the sole wine of its vintage yet in bottle when I tasted in June; and while that represents only a slightly later bottling schedule than in most recent years, Dauvissat planned not to bottle the rest until November. Perhaps not coincidentally, his wines have established an enviable track record for viability in bottle. What’s more, since Dauvissat offers so many older wines for sale – especially, but by no means exclusively, to benefit restaurants – it is easier than at other addresses to monitor just how well they age. If many well-reputed Cote d’Or growers offered their wines at his pace, I suspect they might find few takers! (Since it applies to nearly all of Sebastien Dauvissat 2012s tasted in June following their harvest, it’s worth consulting my explanation in the introduction to this report of how I utilize plus signs in rating wines before bottling. Note also that the absence of retail price indicators reflects not the eventual availability of these wines in U.S. markets – which is widespread – but simply the fact that the wines currently on offer stateside as well as at Dauvissat’s cellar door are mostly from vintage 2009 and before!) Imported by Rosenthal Wine Merchant, Pine Plains, NY; tel. (800) 910-1990

(in oak now, this wine will spend its second year in tank): Good pale yellow. Brisk aromas of pineapple, mirabelle and crushed rock. Densely packed but very austere and backward, with sharply delineated flavors of underripe pineapple and lemon oil joined by crushed stone and salty minerality on the bracing finish. Very uncompromising wine, but then this is still an infant.