2012 Domaine Denis Mortet Gevrey-Chambertin Lavaux Saint-Jacques 1er Cru
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Tasting notes
Tasted blind at the annual "Burgfest" tasting in Beaune. The 2012 Gevrey Chambertin 1er Cru Lavaux St Jacques from Domaine Denis Mortet has a sense of confidence on the nose with upfront raspberry preserve, cranberry and red cherry notes with an underlying mineralité that will come through once the patina of new oak subsides. The palate is medium-bodied with supple, rounded tannin, quite fat an voluminous in the mouth, a little modern in style but still balanced and thoroughly pleasurable. I wonder whether this evolve in bottle and achieve its impressive performance from barrel? As such, give this another three or four years.
Critic scores
Allen Meadows, Burghound
Neal Martin
More reviews and scores
(entirely destemmed): Healthy deep red. Slightly reduced aromas of dark berries, minerals, smoky oak, game and pepper. Much more closed today than the Champeaux, showing little easy sweetness but very good cut to its purple fruit flavors. This was quite creamy from barrel last year but in bottle it's more strict than most of Mortet's '12s, even a touch rustic today. A note of noble vegetility adds another dimension to the long, tight finish. Hold this.
Attractive reductive character – that distinct flinty, matchstick note. Dark fruit – very true to type. Serious, savoury but not (quite) austere – has enough ripeness and softness to be drinkable and juicy. (RH)
(70% new oak; cropped at 35 hectoliters per hectare): Distinctly wilder on the nose than the foregoing samples, offering blackberry and game aromas. Dense, silky, very ripe and deep, with a distinctly glyceral, creamy character to the palate-saturating dark fruit flavors. Finishes with outstanding breadth, suave tannins and explosive fruit. Due to the high percentage of millerande grapes, the potential alcohol here was 12.7%, the highest ripeness that Arnaud Mortet can recall for this premier cru. This beauty leaves the taste buds quivering.
About the producer
This estate, today with Arnaud Mortet at the helm, makes some of Gevrey-Chambertin’s finest wines. Working with 16 hectares, as well as a few négociant parcels, this property makes perfumed and chiselled Pinot Noir.