2004 La Romanee

Bernard Hervet, who has guided both Bouchard and William Fevre through their respective comebacks over the last decade, ended his relationship with owner Joseph Henriot as of the beginning of February, but both companies have extremely capable winemakers in place (Philippe Prost at Bouchard and Didier Seguier at William Fevre). I tasted in November with Hervet and Prost. Hervet noted that "one will need to age the 2004 reds to allow them to show their personalities. "A saignee of about 3% was done to red and white wines in 2004, which winemaker Prost described as "like washing off the grapes, which were dusty. The result of this step was purer wines. "Prost used a higher percentage of new oak than usual-including 100% for the grand crus-to bring more tannins naturally. "The vegetative cycle in '04 was bizarre," noted Hervet, and the wines were missing a bit of fine tannins. Hervet noted that 2004 was the first time the house did not start picking on the ban de vendange. "We waited for three days, even for our earliest-maturing sites," he said.