2017 Puligny-Montrachet Village

Assistant winemaker Benoît Riffault, who has been working with Gérard Boudot since 2002, described 2017 as “a compromise between 2015 and 2009. They show the density and gras of the ‘09s and have slightly healthier pHs and softer textures than the very ripe but sometimes rigid 2015s.” He added that the '17s are a very good vintage but don’t have the acidity of the 2014s. Riffault noted that yields were even lower in some of the estate’s holdings in 2017 than in 2016 (45 hectoliters per hectare overall for the domain, with some vineyards as low as 30), but pointed out that as most of the estate’s holdings are in Puligny-Montrachet, they did not have significant frost issues in ’16.

Riffault, who is married to Boudot's daughter Emilie and vinifies with her and her father, told me that the estate has not done any lees stirring for at least the last eight years. Current plans as of early June were to rack the lesser wines in July and bottle them in November and December. The rest will be racked just prior to the 2018 harvest and bottled next February or March. Incidentally, as of this vintage, Gérard Boudot is sealing all of his bottles with white wax capsules made with paraffin.