Prefer the old site?Launch →

Domaine Drouhin-Laroze

Caroline Drouhin-Laroze took me through the 2019s at the winery located in the heart of the village of Gevrey-Chambertin. Since entering the domaine in 2008, she, along with her brother, Nicolas, has gently steered Drouhin-Laroze onto a different course. “We did a green harvest as we had to be careful with the number of bunches and separate the doubles,” she told me. “It was a crazy vintage because when we saw the grapes, they were perfect. The alcohol levels went up one degree alcohol in five days.” The harvest began on 13 September and lasted until 22 September. “My father said he had never seen such a even harvest. The average yield was around 30-35hl/ha. There is a little more body than usual and the highest alcohol is in Clos de Vougeot which is over 14.0°. We used 30% whole clusters for most of the range. It’s a great vintage with a lot of maturity and freshness. The only shame is that some appellations such as Chapelle-Chambertin lost a bit of elegance.”

Recent vintages have shown much precision and terroir expression than I found in the 1990s and 2000s and the introduction of whole bunches has benefitted the wines. But I have been cautious with my scores this year. Why? The main reason is that I found some of the cuvées weighed down by a disproportionately large amount of new oak. That could well be because the unexpected shortfall in crop obliged them to use more new barrels than intended. For example, the Gevrey-Chambertin Dix Climats used 40% new wood when half that would have been sufficient. It just felt that the wood tannins were too strong on finishes and occluded the individuality of the vineyards. Hopefully that will become assimilated during the remainder of barrel maturation and during bottle ageing, but I wonder whether sunny vintages suit the style of winemaking. Caroline Drouhin-Laroze confessed that the vintage that has excited her the most is the cooler 2017. Maybe what is needed is a little tweaking in terms of canopy management in the vineyard to retard the final sugar levels so that it is synced with phenolic maturity? There are some very good wines here, including a very fine Clos de Vougeot, but this might be one of the cases where the 2017 and 2018 ultimately outperform their 2019s. We shall see.

From La Lumière Noire: 2019 Burgundy - Côte de Nuits (Dec 2020) by Neal Martin

Reviews

Wines

Sort by default

2019 Gevrey-Chambertin Sans Souffre

Color: Red

Subscriber Access Only

Domaine Drouhin-Laroze

2019 Gevrey-Chambertin Sans Souffre

2019 Morey-Saint-Denis Très Girard

2019 Gevrey-Chambertin Dix Climats

2019 Gevrey-Chambertin En Champs

2019 Gevrey-Chambertin Craipillot 1er Cru

2019 Gevrey-Chambertin Au Closeau 1er Cru

2019 Gevrey-Chambertin Clos Prieur 1er Cru

2019 Gevrey-Chambertin Lavaut Saint-Jacques 1er Cru

2019 Chambolle-Musigny Village

2019 Chapelle-Chambertin Grand Cru

2019 Latricières-Chambertin Grand Cru

2019 Bonnes-Mares Grand Cru

2019 Clos de Vougeot Grand Cru

2019 Chambertin Clos-de-Bèze Grand Cru

2019 Musigny Grand Cru

2018 Gevrey-Chambertin Dix Climats

2018 Clos de Vougeot Grand Cru

Content

Engage

Vinous

Social