my stick has been poked.
originally posted by Jay Miller:
1983 - the good ones are perfectly mature right now and drinking well
weird shit. some turned out nice. kinda nice even. but they still make you feel dirty. it's like your neice with the club foot growing up and turning out to be kinda sexy,
1985 - some are faded, some are gorgeous
i still have some of this shit. i'm a fucktard.
trust me. no matter what it is, it tasted better prior to july 88. it won't be horrible, at all, but it won't make you run away and join the circus like it used to when it was young and you wish you still were.
sometimes a puppy is only for christmas.
one of jayer's great vintages for finesse. wtf?
else see 83. but cute rather than sexy. at best.
1987 - some very good ones but no reason not to drink up. I generally prefer it to 1986. a d'Angerville was really really nice a few years ago
i like.
and still not at the "drink up" stage -- a geo. mugneret clos vougeot that joe and i shared the other week could have done with another few years.
1988 - starting to drink well but should mostly hold longer (but I've been saying that for several years)
if you like burgundy, you ought to have poured a shit-load of this down the sink.
oh, you did?
me too.
my sense of regret at buying these is now in conflict with my sense of regret at thinking the i could open a borthod bougogne at ~30 years of age and not find that shit still closed (oh fuck, and i remember tasting it all full of youthful promise and thinking, "88pts, drink 1993 - 2000" -- what went wrong there??).
see 1983. but much sexier.
i need help.
1989 - I've had some Volnays I like very much from this vintage
not as lame as 97. but nearly as lame.
1990 - the good ones can be very good, the bad ones are all stewed fruit, yech
see 1983. in cooler sites (fixin, pernand) this is sexy without the calipers.
but ask to see medical records.
1991 - I find it more consistently good
i was looking through old paperwork the other day, and was surprised to discover that i'd managed to get through 4 cases of chevillon chaignots from 91 (i must have liked something about it), without ever coming close to that, "no, just hold me," moment. or even a, "no, please, just hold my hand," moment either.
slightly tannic and slightly unfocussed acidity... a monet vintage on the whole, and not as good as the geeks paint it. (nor is it as bad for whites as auntie told you.)
1992 - had some great ones years ago, nothing recently
cute puppies. twenty years ago. what kind of perv are you?
1993 - starting to show well, but certainly hold your grand crus
good. better now than they've ever been. and less variable with age than you were told.
1994 - yet to have one I liked but of course I only bought my first Burgundies with the 1995 vintage
meh. bizzarely, the only denis bachelet wine i;ve ever enjoyed is the charmes vv in this vintage
1995 - very good vintage, still needs time, Roumier village Chambolle is hauntingly beautiful (haven't had any of their others but I believe Maureen that they're good too)
nice. bit blocky. the kind of vintage where people who drink bordeaux get to taste it young and say, "now that's what i call burgundy."
only not as fucked up as that implies.
1996 - I'm betting they'll all come around eventually
see 83, 72.
1997 - a few producers did well (Mugnier, Dujac, Rousseau, especially Gouges come to mind) but most are pretty disappointing
burgundy for cock-monkeys.
1998 - I like this vintage very much and many of them are drinking well now too. Thought it was mainly a Cote d'Or vintage at first but in the last few years I've had some great Volnays.
best in the villages that give you black rather than red fruits.
see 91.
1999 - letting mine sleep
see 85
2000 - one of my favorite vintages for current drinking
is good now. but in the way that some very ordinary chicks were hot for six months or so in their late teens; some thrills *are* time-limited, and you should enjoy them while you can.
2001 - letting mine sleep, re hail - avoid Volnay but not Savigny
cool fruit. good acid. fatboy likes. (i don't drink much volnay, but i did buy a few cases of lafarge bourgogne in 01, and its absence from the fatcave suggests there was more there than hail. i think.)
2002 - letting mine sleep
blocky. see 95.
roundhead pinot. i did not buy.
2003 - my original negative reaction has been tempered by a few impressive wines. Those few should be great down the line but I still think the vast majority are not my cup of tea.
i'm sure they can ripen pinot in the languedoc too.
2004 - haven't tried any since shortly after release. Between the people saying the green streak is getting worse (I'm not especially sensitive to it but if it gets very bad...) and other people saying it's an early drinking vintage I may try to pull some and check in
see 86. and 98. i like for its drinkability. and there's way less greenness where people are working with old vines.
2005 - holding for my retirement years
see 88. pour more wine down drain. feel cheated.'
decry the inconsistency of burgundy.
then marvel at last bottle.
think that if you were supposed to waste 11 bottles to get to the blah blah experience of the last one, you wouldn't have.
uh. and then decide that the great experience was worth it after all.
officially declare the new found consistency of burgundy.
rinse and repeat
2006 - only tried a few less expensive bottlings none of which thrilled me. I'm trying to redirect my wine expenditures towards some other areas that aren't as well represented in my cellar. It's hard. Brad has helped recently.
see 98 and 2000.