2000 Nuits Saint-Georges Rue de Chaux

According to Christophe Drag, vintage 2001 brought the lowest sugars of recent years at this domain, with the wines beginning at 11% to 11.5% and chaptalized about a degree and half. But Drag noted that the polyphenols were riper in 2001 than in the previous year. (He also mentioned that 2002 brought grape sugars as high as 13.5%, with pHs freakishly low.) Drag, incidentally, views the '99 vintage as "too generic, without enough typicity," largely due to the very high yields. For his parcels of vines that have never ripened well, Drag is converting his pruning system to cordon royat in an effort to control the vigor of the vines and reduce yields. Chauvenet's 2000s were bottled in May of 2002, perhaps a bit later than was ideal for this style of vintage; at least a couple of these wines seemed a bit advanced in November.

The most important recent development at this domain was the addition of temperature-controlled fermentation tanks for the 2000 harvest, which enabled winemaker Christophe Drag to bring the temperature down to 10o or 11oC, in order to carry out a pre-fermentation maceration. "Now we can start to ferment when we want to," said Drag. Drag also prunes more severely today and did some green harvesting in 1999 though not in 2000. The Chauvenet 2000s have rather low pHs for the vintage, without any acidification, and late malolactic fermentations have further contributed to the impression of cleanness and freshness. For the first time, a couple of Drag other premier crus seemed almost as impressive as the estate's perennial top bottling from Vaucrains. Interestingly, Drag did some saignee in 1999, and again in 2001, but not in 2000. This is a risky method, not to be undertaken lightly, as one risks running off some of the sweetest juice, Drag explained. On my November visit, I preferred most of the 2000s to their '99 counterparts for their balance and sweetness; the latter wines, mostly from fruit harvested after the rains and thus perhaps diluted by water, may have been knocked off balance by the saignee