1999 Meursault En l'Ormeau

Yves Boyer did a slightly longer debourbage post-fermentation settling of the wine] to make a finer style of wine in 2000, but insisted that the lees were healthy. He described the vintage as "a supple set of wines for medium-term aging, with lots of fruit flavors." In grape sugars and acid levels, they are quite close to the '99s, he noted. But the 2000s generally finished drier than the '99s, Boyer said, adding that in the last four or five years, it has been easier to get his wines to go totally dry with wild yeasts, possibly due to the longer decanting he now does following the fermentation. Even in the mid-'90s, the wines tended to finish with around two grams per liter of residual sugar, he told me. (A Peter Vezan selection; importers include North Berkeley Imports, Berkeley, CA; Michael Skurnik Wines, Syosset, NY; Vintner Select, Cincinnati, OH; and Dionysos Imports, Lorton, VA; the higher prices shown in the ranges below are those of North Berkeley Imports, which in most cases has made barrel selections and had the wine bottled without fining or filtration)

"The '99s are supple, agreeable wines with thoroughly enrobed acidity," says Yves Boyer. "They're for drinking on the early side, but they may yet surprise us with their ability to age as they appear to have taken on body in barrel. Still, the '99s should be drunk before '97 and '96, but after the '98s. The '98s, with their pale gold colors, are a bit too ripe. Fruit affected by oidium tends eventually to give a mushroomy taste," Boyer adds. "I may have picked a bit late in '98; certainly we gained nothing by waiting." Boyer benefits from a high percentage of old vines-"all massale no clones, which means that the yields are never outrageous." (A Peter Vezan selection; importers include North Berkeley Imports, Berkeley, CA (the higher prices shown below are those of North Berkeley Imports, which in most cases has made barrel selections and had the wine bottled without filtration); Michael Skurnik Wines, Westbury, NY; Vintner Select, Cincinnati, OH; and Dionysos Imports, Lorton, VA)