In which I do battle with Premox

L

Levi Dalton

Levi Dalton
This morning over 20 of the boldfaced NYC sommelier names gathered to see what was what concerning this phenomenon known as premox white Burgundy. There was a sit down tasting of 35 white burgundies, originating from 11 of Burgundy's most respected domaines. It is a rare event that draws so many nightshift workers out of bed and to one spot (more or less on time, even!), so clearly some serious curiosity was in the air. Several of the people in the room had made careers around working with and tasting Burgundy. Somehow I was also invited. Apparently my gift for inane and useless commentary is appreciated in such rarefied company. Pity it hasn't gotten me much else of use. However that may be, the tasting went as follows: sit-down with glasses and spitton, partial blind conditions with the identity of the specific bottles obscured (even to those pouring) by tin foil. Only the commune that the bottle originates from is indicated on the foil. Of course the set of wines in entirety to be tasted is known to each taster. So everybody knows Jobard is in there somewhere, etc. Bottles have been sourced from numberous cellars in pot-luck fashion. One bottle of each wine is present and tasted, with two exceptions. The corked rate was low to nonexistent (I had qualms about one bottle, but no one else went along). The bottles were poured in flights, generally 4 wines to a flights. A grading system was instituted: A for pristine, with no oxidation whatsoever. C for oxidation that is present and that should be expected (ie, oxidation that happens in the normal course of development), a C grade also indicates the baseline for serving such a bottle in a restaurant setting. F for wines that are oxidized and that could not be served in good faith in a restaurant. Discussion of scores and reactions from the the assembled tasters occured after each flight. In general, most people (certainly I) had trouble differentiating the premox/no premox mission of the tasting from the is it good/is it not good wine of a normal qualitative tasting, and it emerged as well that different tasters had a individual thresholds for what they would consider oxidized and what they would consider developed maturity.

The vintages were limited to '96,'99, '00, '02, and the producers represented were: Roulot, Lafon, Coche-Dury, Domaine Leflaive, Louis Carillon, Sauzet, Ramonet, Niellon, Francois Jobard, Vincent Dauvissat, and Colin-Deleger. With the exception of one wine, the bottles gathered were at the 1er cru level.

The bottles were served in a way that the vintage of the specific wine was not revealed until after the scores had been given.

Here are my own personal notes.

Flight 1:
1996 Dauvissat "Forets" grade A
2002 Dauvissat "Forets" grade A
1996 Leflaive Pucelles grade C+
2002 Colin-Deleger "Demoiselles" grade C+

Flight 2:
1999 Roulot "Meix-Chavaux" A but I personally think it is terrible now in terms of disjointed upon opening
2002 Roulot "Meix-Chavaux" A but also echoing the comment above
1996 Roulot "Meix-Chavaux" F
2000 Dauvissat "Forets" F-
with the terrible showing of the '00 Forets a second bottle is procured of the same, and it scores in the C+ range

Flight 3:
2000 Carillon "Champ-Canet" C
1996 Carillon "Champ-Canet" F
2000 Colin-Deleger "Demoiselles" F
1999 Carillon "Champ-Canet" A- not oxidized, but showing botrytis notes and RS

Flight 4:
2000 Sauzet "Referts" C
2002 Leflaive "Pucelles" A and totally awesome
1999 Sauzet "Folatieres" C
1999 Leflaive "Pucelles" A because you can't call it oxidized with this much sulphur maring the finish

Flight 5:
1999 Ramonet "Ruchottes" green label C+ but it was more interesting than that grade would suggest
2000 Ramonet "Ruchottes" green label B but I think (no one else does) that this is corked
1996 Ramonet "Ruchottes" green label C
2000 Ramonet "Ruchottes" white label B+

Flight 6:
2002 F. Jobard "Genevrieres" C
2000 F. Jobard "Genevrieres" C
1996 F. Jobard "Genevrieres" C

Flight 7:
1996 Lafon "Charmes" C for oxidation, F for quality
2000 Lafon "Charmes" A and quite good
1999 Lafon "Charmes" C+ not oxidized, but not that great, either
2002 Lafon "Charmes" A and quite good

Flight 8:
2000 Coche-Dury "Caillerets" A and superb, the highlight of the entire tasting, I find myself exclaiming "this is what it is all about!"
1996 Roulot "Perrieres" F totally weird, maybe not oxidized, but this sucks
2002 Roulot "Perrieres" A but not great on the quality spectrum
2002 Coche-Dury "Caillerets" A and a good wine

Flight 9:
2000 Niellon "Chaumees" C oatmeal toast with no definition
2002 Niellon "Chaumees" C lousy oatmeal nose
1996 Niellon "Champ-Gains" C short, orange marmalade
1996 Niellon "Chaumees" C with some bubbles on the palate texture

In general the consesus was that much worse was expected from many of these bottles, and there was almost an aubible sigh at the end of the day. Several people commented that they had been prepared for more of a slugfest of wading through oxidized bottles, but that it hadn't been so bad after all. There was a feeling that several '00s showed better than expected, that '02 really is a neat-o vintage, and the '96s were simply overhyped when released.

These scores were my own, and do not reflect the scores of the group or their comments. Others were more kind to Roulot and Jobard than I.
 
Just maybe it is not as bad as one might from reading reports. The bottles on this particular day told a pretty positive tale.
 
Interesting report, but I can't get past a "C" as somehow being OK. Especially in this age of grade inflation. Shouldn't that have been a B+?

Also, how could you judge if it was appropriately evolved for its age if the vintages were hidden?
 
A grade of C was considered baseline okay and serveable. Like in the following situation you would serve it to guests in your restaurant: guest picks up the wine list, orders wine X, you bring wine X from the cellar and open it, it is not corked and it tastes like such and such. Do you in good faith serve the bottle and put it on the bill?

The whole vintage situation brought on a lot of debate. I edited at least two scores after I found out the vintages involved, myself.
 
originally posted by Chris Coad:
Extraordinary Popular Delusions & the Madness of Crowds?
Click to expand...

It's an example of the problem with anecdotal information and self-selection. Even the PremOx wiki is nothing like a statistically valid sample. All that can really be concluded is that there does appear to be higher-than-expected incidence of very oxidized White Burgs, but no one is in a position to assess the percentage of affected bottles except perhaps the Domaines themselves -- and they aren't talking AFAIK. Fortunately for me, I have no white Burg left in the cellar.

Mark Lipton
 
originally posted by Chris Coad:
Is this supposed to be a problem just affecting white Burgundy? We seem to be having this same exact discussion regarding late 90s Loire chenin blanc in another thread.
Click to expand...

No, in fact there's also been talk about growing evidence of PremOx in certain reds.

Mark Lipton
 
Man, thank you thank you for this report.
Nothing too shocking given my experience although I thought Leflaive would have done better even in the premox scapegoat vintage, 1996.
But there is another piece to this equation, one which a blind tasting makes a little difficult to consider. On a number of occasions I'd have white burgs which seemed perfectly fine but which were ahead of where they should have been at the time, thus reducing the ultimate potential. This was often the case a year or two ago with 99s and 00s, for example.
A glass of chardonnay over the holidays perhaps, when Joe is back? :-)
 
There is Chablis, you know. And you can do the two-fisted thing, with a glass of 07 Briords in the other hand as a chaser.
 
originally posted by MLipton:
originally posted by Chris Coad:
Is this supposed to be a problem just affecting white Burgundy? We seem to be having this same exact discussion regarding late 90s Loire chenin blanc in another thread.
Click to expand...

No, in fact there's also been talk about growing evidence of PremOx in certain reds.

Mark Lipton
Click to expand...

IT'S EVERYWHERE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
 
originally posted by VLM:
AAAIIIIIIII!!!!!!
originally posted by MLipton:
originally posted by Chris Coad:
Is this supposed to be a problem just affecting white Burgundy? We seem to be having this same exact discussion regarding late 90s Loire chenin blanc in another thread.
Click to expand...

No, in fact there's also been talk about growing evidence of PremOx in certain reds.

Mark Lipton
Click to expand...

IT'S EVERYWHERE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Click to expand...
First they came for the whites. Now they're coming for the reds. What's next?
 
originally posted by lars makie:
originally posted by VLM:
AAAIIIIIIII!!!!!!
originally posted by MLipton:
originally posted by Chris Coad:
Is this supposed to be a problem just affecting white Burgundy? We seem to be having this same exact discussion regarding late 90s Loire chenin blanc in another thread.
Click to expand...

No, in fact there's also been talk about growing evidence of PremOx in certain reds.

Mark Lipton
Click to expand...

IT'S EVERYWHERE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Click to expand...
First they came for the whites. Now they're coming for the reds. What's next?
Click to expand...

THE SKY IS FALLING!!! THE SKY IS FALLING!!!

--
C. Little
 
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