2019 Pommard Epenots 1er Cru

One of the most comical episodes during my five weeks in Burgundy was at Dubreuil-Fontaine. I was a little perplexed by their 2019 reds at the time. In the evening I received a message from proprietor/winemaker Christine Gruere-Dubreuil asking if it was possible to come back and re-taste them. Apparently her cellar hand had misheard the instruction and pulled the 2020s instead of the 2019s! No wonder they felt a bit primal, though neither she nor I twigged at the time. Thankfully, there was a small window the following day and I managed to tick off her reds. “The 2019 vintage was not too early,” Christine told me, flanked by her daughter Clémentine, who at the moment works on the administrative side but will surely take an increasing role in the future. “We started the harvest on 12 September. The crop was easy to pick and clean. That spring was quite easy and there was little disease pressure and no frost. The crop was not very large, especially for the whites, all together around 35-40hl/ha though the higher-yielding Bourgogne Rouge skews that figure. It is the first vintage we didn’t use any chaptalization and some of the alcohol levels are pretty high between 14.0° and 15.0°, but the acidity levels were better than last year. During the harvest it was very hot and the sugar levels went up very quickly. The alcoholic fermentation went well and we did not have to inoculate with the yeast as we did in 2018 and 2020. The acidity was between 4.0 and 5.5mg/l in the must. The whites are more mineral-driven than in 2018 and I think they will warrant ageing. We used 10-15% new oak and up to 30% new oak on the whites, pretty much the same for the reds.”

This was a good set of wines from Dubreuil-Fontaine although occasionally I am concerned about some of the high alcohol levels, such as in the Corton-Perrières at a hangover-inducing 15.3°. I actually prefer a couple of the fine Pernand-Vergelesses from quality Premier Crus such as Sous Frétille and Clos Berthet. As for the 2020s, I kept my notes and it will be interesting to compare them to those I take in 12 months time, so long as the 2021s have not been pulled.