2000 Gevrey-Chambertin Cherbaudes 1er Cru

The cloudy, damp weather in the three weeks prior to the 2001 vintage resulted in lower grape sugars and strong acidity, Jean-Marie Fourrier told me, as it was necessary to pick because rot was starting (Fourrier ultimately harvested in five days flat.) But the acids really helped with the extraction from the grapes, especially for those like me who don't normally do very extractive vinifications. Due to the high percentage of malic acidity, the wines were very tough to taste after the fermentations," Fourrier went on. Fourrier describes his laissez-faire approach to winemaking, in which he vinifies consistent with the style of the year and avoids any manipulations, as "the philosophy of doing nothing." The malos here did not start until July (some barrels still had not finished in November) and the wines had not yet been racked. The wines are not yet fat in the back of the mouth; they haven't gotten round yet," said Fourrier, who will bottle on the late side, between April and June. Incidentally, Fourrier is not an adherent of leaf-pulling, currently in vogue in Burgundy. If you remove leaves, you'll have less rot," he maintained. But you also compromise photosynthesis, so you get less ripeness and more acidity." What with Fourrier's enthusiasm and the large number of wines at this address, I found myself running late for my next appointment and had to be satisfied with a limited selection of Fourrier's 2000s. The Clos Saint-Jacques was a standout.

"With all the problems our region had with worms and rot in July of 2000, you could either spray or do nothing," explained Jean-Marie Fourrier. "If you did nothing, 30% to 50% of your fruit would be affected by rot, and then you'd have no choice but to vinify with a lot of sulfur. I used insecticide and anti-rot sprays, and the problem was gone in ten days. Still, the berries were big in 2000 due to the rain," noted Fourrier, "so even if the yield was lower than in '99 there was a higher ratio of juice to skins." Fourrier thus did a saignee for the first time, draining off anywhere from 5% to 8% of the juice prior to the fermentation. Fourrier 2000s were still aging on their original lees in November. "You needed clean grapes to do long lees aging," he noted.