Morey-Saint-Denis Grand Cru

Morey-St-Denis is the smallest viticultural village of the Côte de Nuits, Vougeot apart, with under 150 hectares of vines. The commune is very narrow, less than 1.5km wide from entering Morey from Chambolle on the Route des Grands Crus to leaving it for Gevrey.

The Grand Crus:

Clos de la Roche 16.90ha
Clos de la Roche wines are quintessentially Morey in style, not that easy to define yet clearly very fine wines, with a slight aromatic wildness which differentiates them from a top Chambolle-Musigny, and a tight linear structure which ensures longevity. The aromatics are more subtle but less sumptuous than Clos St Denis. Leading growers: Domaine Ponsot and Domaine Dujac, Armand Rousseau, Armand Rousseau.

Clos St-Denis 6.62ha
St Denis (which name is in origin derived from Dionysus) had his head chopped off by pagan priests, who disliked his conversion rate to Christianity. He apparently still managed to tuck his head under his arm and walk, preaching all the way, to what is now the Paris suburb of St Denis near where the Stade de France has recently been built.

It is hard to persuade any of the Seysses family of Domaine Dujac to offer a clear distinction between their Clos de la Roche and Clos St-Denis, except perhaps that the former goes into its shell during adolescence more than the latter. I sense a slightly more sumptuous character compared to its twin, but perhaps not as strong a bone structure for the long term

Clos de Tart 7.53ha
There have only been three owners of Clos de Tart since 1141: the Marey, later Marey-Monge, family bought the property after the nuns were dispossessed in 1791 and kept it until 1932 when it was purchased by the Mommessin family. Though the Mommessins subsequently sold their family business in the Beaujolais to Jean-Claude Boisset, they retained ownership of the Clos de Tart. The domaine has been regenerated since the appointment of Sylvain Pitiot, co-author of the Nouvel Atlas des Grands Vignobles de Bourgogne, as manager in 1996. 

Clos des Lambrays 8.84ha
The Clos is in fact a monopoly of the Domaine des Lambrays.