2017 Chambolle-Musigny, La Combe d'Orveaux, Domaine Jean Grivot, Burgundy
About this WINE
Domaine Jean Grivot
Jean Grivot took over from his father, Gaston, in 1955. He handed the domaine on to his son Étienne – married to Marielle Bize from Savigny – in the early 1980s. When Étienne took over, the house style was for gentle, graceful wines, perhaps a little weak in lesser vintages. Étienne then found his own voice, making a range of increasingly fine wines. From the mid-2000s onwards, he reduced yields and fine-tuned work in the vineyard and cellar. His children, Mathilde and Hubert, who made their first vintage with Étienne in 2010, took the reins fully in 2017.
Chambolle-Musigny
Chambolle produces the most elegant wines in the Côte de Nuits, having more active chalk and less clay in the soil than the other villages. The wines may be a little lighter in colour and less tannic than Gevrey-Chambertin but they have a sublime concentration of fruit. Village Chambolle-Musigny usually provides excellent value.
Le Musigny is one of the top half-dozen vineyards in Burgundy, producing wines of extraordinary intensity and yet with a magical velvety character. Les Amoureuses is immediately appealing, a wonderfully sensual wine which deserves Grand Cru status. Bonnes Mares tends to have a firmer structure and ages very well
- 94 hectares of village Chambolle-Musigny.
- 61 hectares of Premier Cru vineyards (24 in all). The finest vineyards include Les Amoureuses, Les Charmes, Les Fuées, Les Baudes and Sentiers.
- 24 hectares of Grand Cru vineyard - Bonnes Mares and Le Musigny.
- Recommended producers: de Vogüé, Mugnier, Roumier, Barthod.
- Recommended restaurant: Le Chambolle
Pinot Noir
Pinot Noir is probably the most frustrating, and at times infuriating, wine grape in the world. However when it is successful, it can produce some of the most sublime wines known to man. This thin-skinned grape which grows in small, tight bunches performs well on well-drained, deepish limestone based subsoils as are found on Burgundy's Côte d'Or.
Pinot Noir is more susceptible than other varieties to over cropping - concentration and varietal character disappear rapidly if yields are excessive and yields as little as 25hl/ha are the norm for some climats of the Côte d`Or.
Because of the thinness of the skins, Pinot Noir wines are lighter in colour, body and tannins. However the best wines have grip, complexity and an intensity of fruit seldom found in wine from other grapes. Young Pinot Noir can smell almost sweet, redolent with freshly crushed raspberries, cherries and redcurrants. When mature, the best wines develop a sensuous, silky mouth feel with the fruit flavours deepening and gamey "sous-bois" nuances emerging.
The best examples are still found in Burgundy, although Pinot Noir`s key role in Champagne should not be forgotten. It is grown throughout the world with notable success in the Carneros and Russian River Valley districts of California, and the Martinborough and Central Otago regions of New Zealand.
When is a wine ready to drink?
We provide drinking windows for all our wines. Alongside the drinking windows there is a bottle icon and a maturity stage. Bear in mind that the best time to drink a wine does also depend on your taste.
Not ready
These wines are very young. Whilst they're likely to have lots of intense flavours, their acidity or tannins may make them feel austere. Although it isn't "wrong" to drink these wines now, you are likely to miss out on a lot of complexity by not waiting for them to mature.
Ready - youthful
These wines are likely to have plenty of fruit flavours still and, for red wines, the tannins may well be quite noticeable. For those who prefer younger, fruitier wines, or if serving alongside a robust meal, these will be very enjoyable. If you choose to hold onto these wines, the fruit flavours will evolve into more savoury complexity.
Ready - at best
These wines are likely to have a beautiful balance of fruit, spice and savoury flavours. The acidity and tannins will have softened somewhat, and the wines will show plenty of complexity. For many, this is seen as the ideal time to drink and enjoy these wines. If you choose to hold onto these wines, they will become more savoury but not necessarily more complex.
Ready - mature
These wines are likely to have plenty of complexity, but the fruit flavours will have been almost completely replaced by savoury and spice notes. These wines may have a beautiful texture at this stage of maturity. There is lots to enjoy when drinking wines at this stage. Most of these wines will hold in this window for a few years, though at the very end of this drinking window, wines start to lose complexity and decline.
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Description
Back in the fold after last year’s obliteration, this has an interesting extra bit of girth – but not atypically, as the vineyard sits on the boundary with VosneRomanée. The warmth of the vintage gives a ripe and positive texture to the palate. Drink 2020-2024.
Jean Grivot, whose name continues to appear on the labels, took over from his father Gaston in 1955 and handed the estate on to his son Étienne in the early 1980s. Étienne, married to Marielle Bize from Savigny, has been through a number of incarnations as winemaker here. When he took over, his father’s style was for gentle, graceful wines which perhaps were a little weak in the lesser vintages. Since then Étienne has found his own voice and made a range of increasingly fine wines. The drive to reduce yields and fine-tune his work in the vineyards and cellar since the mid-2000s continues to enhance quality. The succession to the next generation is now well underway, with Mathilde and Hubert increasingly influential, under their father’s experienced and wise guidance.
Here the decision was to wait for a bit of rain, to get the skins and berries fully ripe. The rain did the trick and the resulting wines are among the best of the Côte this year. Adjectives tumbled from Étienne during the tasting: seductive and precise, glamorous, graphite and saline, luminous and suave. We both agreed we rather liked “resonant”. Volumes are up 50 percent but Étienne warned us that the run of short vintages has depleted their reserves, and as such allocations this year will not move up in line.
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