2023 Romanee St Vivant

The 2023 Romanée-Saint-Vivant Grand Cru is deep and structured, unwinding in the glass with aromas of dark berries, burning embers, orange zest, petals and exotic spices. Medium to full-bodied, fleshy and layered, with a dense core of fruit framed by powdery structuring tannins, even in this vintage it will demand a little patience. This is another strong set of wines from Charles Van Canneyt—but that won't surprise readers familiar with this estate's consistent excellence. Van Canneyt has had the reins here for over a decade now, and his approach has crystalized: the predominantly destemmed fruit, retained intact, is fermented in cement tanks for a classical maceration of two to three weeks. Élevage is in barrels now predominantly sourced from Cavin, with Cadus in a supporting role, and lasts fully 18 months in the domaine's cold cellar, with the exception of the Bourgogne Rouge, which is bottled before harvest. These uncomplicated methods, combined with an enviable palette of appellations planted with notably old vines, produce elegant, charming wines with impressive substance and aging potential. I've been buying them for my own cellar since my student days, so this is an address I warmly recommend.

Here the elegant nose is cool, airy and beautifully layered with its essence of red cherry, violet, Asian-style tea and hoisin scents. The lacy, even silky, textured middle weight flavors are shaped by wonderfully fine-grained tannins on the moderately austere, balanced and impressively long finale. This does need to develop better depth but that should simply be a matter of exercising some patience. Drink from 2035.

The 2023 Romanée-Saint-Vivant Grand Cru was the last cuvée to finish its malo. This has a compelling mineral-driven bouquet with intense red berry fruit, razor-sharp delineation and poise. It's perhaps a level-up from the previous vintage. The palate is medium-bodied with a plush entry. It's velvety smooth in texture, with a patina of oak to be subsumed, but there is plenty of weight on the finish and a wonderful peppery aftertaste. It's one of the more powerful wines from the domaine, but it will give many years of pleasure. This is fabulous. Charles van Canneyt is a bit stressed. His plane was delayed from San Sebastián, which meant a last-minute rejigging of my afternoon schedule. The silver lining is that it allowed more time, since his was my last visit of the day. Not only could I taste the wines from Hudelot-Nöellat, but also the first three wines from his Domaine des Chezeaux project. This is going forward now that negotiations with Laurent Ponsot reached an amicable conclusion, and I will taste the extended range next year. "We knew it would be a generous vintage, but we weren't expecting quantities like this," van Canneyt admits. "We did a green harvest in some vineyards, mostly in the Bourgogne Rouge and one or two in Chambolle with respect to the younger vines. This helped control yields. We had very warm weather during harvest, so we had to pick early. We began on September 11. There are a lot of differences between producers [in terms of when to pick]. We had to be quick, as the sanitary conditions were declining, but fortunately we have a large team of 50 pickers plus 15 carriers. I decided to do a saignée, which is something my grandfather used to do. I was a bit nervous at first. We removed the riper juice to keep grapes with more acidity, and this helped to naturally concentrate the wines, which is easier to extract. Everything is destemmed as usual, with aging in a maximum of 50% new oak for the Grand Crus. Some of the malos finished just two weeks ago, and I added some SO2 afterwards. I am happy because the wines are ripe but not overripe, refreshing compared to 2019 and 2022. They will probably drink earlier, but the balance means that they should age well."