2015 Puligny-Montrachet Village

Gérard Boudot, who made a bit more than half a crop in 2016, told me it’s hard to compare this vintage with an earlier year. “Maybe a fatter version of 2007 for some estates,” he offered. “But there’s a huge disparity between cuvées in 2016 due to the frost. Some wines will be best early for their fruit but the rest should be normal mid-term agers—up to 12 years. The ripeness is not exceptional and the wines are not especially aromatic today, but they are solid, not fragile, and the acidity is good.” Boudot did very little chaptalization beyond his Puligny-Montrachet La Garenne, and limited the percentage of new oak for his premier crus to about 22%. He planned to rack his ‘16s in July but won’t bottle anything until January—and later for his top crus.

The 2015s, in contrast, “have the fruit to give early pleasure but will probably be good at every stage. The wines are easy but I don’t mean that pejoratively and the terroirs come through. The grapes were golden without surmaturité and there was nothing to eliminate on the sorting table. The wines are not especially intellectual but neither will they need long aging.” Boudot considers the vintage to be outstanding, noting that the 2009s were “more marked by their vintage." Incidentally, he told me that he's drinking wines earlier for their fruit as he gets older.

“We were very lucky after the last day of heat and south wind on August 31, as we had only a few millimeters of rain that night” [as opposed to the violent hailstorm that struck Chablis], said winemaker Benoît Riffault. Domaine Sauzet had waited a few extra days “for the skins to soften a little,” but the fruit was technically ripe earlier. The estate picked its Chardonnay at potential alcohol levels between 13% and 14% and did not acidify.

“For me, the wines have energy,” Riffault told me, with pHs between 3.15 and 3.3 and acidity levels between 3.8 and 4.0 grams after the malolactic fermentations. “The 2015s are not extreme or atypical,” he went on. “I’m not sure if the vintage is great or just very good. It’s not the type of vintage I prefer to drink but the wines have good aging potential. They have more fruit and they’re juicier and more energetic than the 2003s.”

The 2015s were still in barrels at the time of my visit and Riffault told me he did not plan to de-gas them at the racking, explaining that years with low malic acidity generally have less gas. He also believes that the 2015s will get more compact by the time they're bottled.