1999 Montrachet Grand Cru

Winemaker Pierre Morey describes the '99s as very ripe, in spite of the huge crop. "We got 30% more volume than we predicted just before the harvest, and it was necessary to reorganize our picking strategies and buy more barrels," Morey explained. "But the grapes ripened regularly and swelled with water very slowly; that why the quality of the vintage is high." Domaine Leflaive used a helicopter in the vineyards on three consecutive mornings during the harvest to dry the grapes. Still, Morey admits, there was a difference in quality between the grapes picked before and after the rain. The malos were mostly finished when I stopped by at the end of June; those barrels that had not finished their secondary fermentations tended to have better acidity than the others, "but they're so rich that you don't taste it," Morey claims. He was just beginning to rack the wines at the time of my visit.