2009 Vosne-Romanée Les Chaumes 1er Cru

Jean-Nicolas Méo began harvesting on September 12. He did 17-18 days of cuvaison and did one racking before the wines were prepared for bottling. I was not able to taste a handful of wines that were racked just before my visit, including the Cros Parantoux. Méo is among the growers who believe The 2009s will age well on their depth of fruit.

I tasted in November with assistant enologist Coralie Allexant, then received an update from Jean-Nicolas Meo on the progress of the 2009s shortly before going to press with this issue. "Obviously 2009 was a very ripe year, with a very fine month of August," Meo told me. "I think the sugars shot up at the very end, just before the harvest. We probably could have picked a little earlier, but not much, perhaps two days." Following the fermentations, acidity levels are low and pHs on the high side, but the slow evolution of the wines in barrel has helped reinforce their structures, Meo added. He told me that the wines tasted especially pleasant when I visited in November but since then they have acquired "more seriousness, not to say austerity." Still, he considers them to be "very fat and pleasant wines with a good capacity to age," closer in character to 1999 than to 2005, which he considers to be almost almost opposite in style. (Kermit Lynch Wine Merchant, Berkeley, CA; also represented by Domaines Saveurs/Jeanne-Marie de Champs, imported by Frederick Wildman & Sons, New York, NY and Winebow, Somerville, MA) Also recommended: 2009 Marsannay (85-87).