2017 Pommard Clos des Epeneaux 1er Cru

“It was a hard season," winemaker Paul Zanetti told me when I visited Comte Armand in the heart of Pommard, opposite the church. “It was very warm, for sure. I go on holiday at the end of July every year. I just wanted to come back and check the vineyard at the beginning of August, and I could see the leaves beginning to fall. In one week the vineyard had changed completely. I had never seen it like this, and I knew we had to be ready [to harvest] in two weeks. The wines are all above 14.5° even though we started picking on August 24. I can feel the impact of the wall around the clos when you compare the Clos des Epeneaux with other vineyards. It was a vintage where you had to really reflect. We did a cold maceration. The yeasts found it difficult to finish the fermentation, but I did not add any cultured yeast – it just meant we had to have a four-week maceration. We did some punch-down as the skin was so ripe. In the end, I cropped at around 25hl/ha, though that’s more than in 2021 at 18hl/ha. Maybe I will do a longer barrel maturation.” This was a fine set of wines, the hidden gem being the overlooked Volnay Fremiets, which this year challenges the supremacy of the Pommard Clos des Epeneaux.

Winemaker Paul Zanetti has overseen some outstanding wines from this Pommard Domaine since joining back in 2010. (Has it really been that long? It seems like yesterday that Benjamin Leroux was showing the wines. Time flies). “For a few years we haven’t had a cool growing season,” he began as we discussed the 2019 in one of the small barrel cellars. “There was a threat of frost in the beginning of the season, but we did not have to burn any straw. [Vine] growth was very quick, which is why it’s important to have a big team at the moment. Flowering took a long time because of the inclement weather, which is why the production was small in addition to the berries being small in size. But the summer was nice, and August was warm. It was easy as there was very little mildew or oïdium. We lost 20% of the yield compared to a normal year, less than 30hl/ha on average, the smallest in Volnay. I started the harvest on 11 September with Volnay Fremiet and finished 17 September. I used more whole bunches in 2019, especially for the Auxey-Duresses, 30-40% as I wanted to have a full tank and bunches were fully ripe. The vinification was quite easy. You had to be careful with the sugar-levels. When you press the wine is not protected, so there is a risk of brettanomyces or volatile acidity. It was the same in 2020. This is why I keep the press in tank. I think we have to reflect on the work in the vineyard, in terms of canopy management and protecting bunches. The 2019s are quite high in alcohol, between 13.6° and 14.3° for the Clos des Epeneaux, but there is plenty of freshness. There is an impact of the clos, the wall, on the alcohol levels. The malolactic was very quick since the sun reduced the level. I will rack just before Christmas and then bottle in January.” This producer’s small portfolio is headlined by their 5.23-hectare monopole of Clos des Épeneaux, but readers should also seek their oft-overlooked cuvées in Volnay and Auxey-Duresses. You will find reviews of both the 2019 in barrel and bottled 2018s. Apropos the Pommard Clos des Épeneaux, Zanetti poured the 2018 and 2017 vintages that confirmed the impressive consistency given the challenges faced in the growing seasons. There are very intense, structured and pure: Pommard predesigned for cellaring.

Winemaker Paul Zanetti had to suddenly rush off due to a personal matter when I visited Comte Armand, so I am grateful to his assistant Catherine Petrie MW for not only guiding me through a tasting of 2017 and 2018s, but subsequently sending me such a wealth of information that Vinous readers must be the most informed on the planet. Petrie told me: "For both 2017 and 2018 we started on the picking 3 September and picked for seven days. On Monday 3 September we picked Volnay Frémiets and Volnay village when it was warm and sunny/cloudy – perfect weather for picking. On Tuesday 4 September we picked the young vines in Clos des Epeneaux when it was sunny and hot, the older vines under sunny and hot conditions the following day. On 6 September we picked another parcel in Clos des Epeneaux, but heavy rain fell in the early afternoon and picking was abandoned for the rest of the day. On Friday 7 September we picked a fourth parcel of Clos des Epeneaux and Chardonnay. The air felt much cooler and fresher, clear sunny skies. On Saturday 8 September we picked Auxey 1er Cru and Auxey Village, when it was sunny and warm and the following day we picked the Aligoté, vendangeurs finished at midday. We slowly sorted at the winery before passing through the destemmer, trying to keep the whole berries as intact as possible. A very small amount of whole bunch fruit is included: the best bunches where signs of lignification in the stem is evident were selected, but in reality, given the large volumes of both 2017 and 2018 we did a maximum of 10% on some tanks, and generally less on others. We did a cold soak for between four and eight days. We practiced remontage without air during this period, and with air once the must has begun to ferment. Pigéage (usually by foot: ‘à l’ancienne’) was practiced during fermentation, with most tanks being plunged between 2 and 5 times in total. We tasted the musts twice a day during fermentation, with Paul deciding on the day's programme after having tasted in the morning. Towards the end of fermentation we did remontage with a bucket (really!), which is a very gentle way of ensuring the cap is kept wet, but does not result in too hard an extraction in the now solvent alcoholic environment. Tanks were so full in 2018 we needed to do a bit of juggling. As the volume of each tank expanded during fermentation some threatened to overflow, so we carried out a series of mini délestages (rack and return). We would draw some juice off in the morning, plunge the cap if necessary, and put the juice back over the top of the cap in the early afternoon. Pulling all the juice off and leaving the grape solids as an almost dry cake before returning the juice, these mini-délestages were used only to reduce the volume a little, quite simply so that we didn’t have fruit all over the floor. As a consequence we were doing lots of mini settlings, and leaving behind some of the heavy lees that would be deposited at the bottom of the tanks used to hold the juice. Because the caps were not left dry as in a traditional délestage, the extraction of tannins was not exaggerated in any way. However, the clarity of juice was improved, and the wines gained a creamy, silky texture that we attribute in part to this practice that the large volumes in 2018 obliged. A happy outcome from a tiny cellar and some very busy days! We used 33% new oak for the Clos des Epeneaux, 30% for the Volnay Frémiets, 20% for the Auxey 1er Cru and 15% for the Village Crus. Yields range from 31hL/ha for the Clos des Epeneaux up to 48hL/ha." “We started the harvest on 3 September, the same as in 2017, the yields in the Clos des Epeneaux around 33-34hl/ha, slight more than the previous year. The first 2018 (the Auxey 1er Cru) was racked out of barrel on 17 and 18 October 2019, so it spends 12 months in barrel. The Auxey, Volnay, and Frémiets will be racked in the next few weeks, whereas the Clos des Epeneaux will stay in barrel for a second winter."

Having visited the domaine at the height of the 2018 harvest when head winemaker Paul Zanetti was tackling crates of bunches pouring in from the vineyard, I returned just four weeks later to taste the 2017s. “Fortunately, there was no frost in 2017, just a little oïdium and mildew, but it was fine at the end of the season,” Zanetti told me, calmer now that his last harvest was safely in the vats. “I did a last treatment at the end of July to preserve the leaves against mildew, and the sanitary conditions were good when the fruit came in. We cropped up to 45hl/ha for the Village Crus and 35hl/ha for the Clos des Epeneaux, starting the picking on September 3 and finishing on September 11 with the Auxey-Duresses and Auxey-Duresses Premier Cru. It was still important to take out any pink berries, and initially the colour extraction was low, so I thought about making an additional punch-down. Instead, I just kept the grapes at 28° Celsius for 10 days to two weeks, and slowly the colour came and the tannin became more rounded and elegant. Everything was de-stemmed. The Clos des Epeneaux is around 13.5% to 13.8% alcohol. The 2017 is my first vintage using all four blocks of the Clos des Epeneaux [since recent vintages have been affected by frost or hail.] We pumped over this week with a small quantity of SO2.”

The 2017s from Comte Armand show genuine succulence and freshness and precocious style; they are wines designed to give pleasure. The good news is that you do not have to secure an allocation of Clos des Epeneaux to enjoy these wines. Make a beeline for the Auxey-Duresses 1er Cru, a delightful Pinot Noir packed with ripe fruit, or the Volnay Les Fremiets, which exudes purity and precision. As my tasting note indicates, I tasted the Pommard Clos des Epeneaux from three different cuvées due to be blended and bottled just before Christmas, each illustrating their contribution to the blend. Whilst I feel that the 2017 might not necessarily be up there with the greatest vintages, it will be a sensual and saline Pommard that will surely offer a couple of decades of drinking pleasure.