2015 Vosne-Romanée Village

Jean-Nicolas Méo started harvesting his Pinot Noir on September 3, then stopped for a couple of days on the 6th and 7th, ultimately finishing on September 11. He now wishes he had picked one or two days earlier. “We had a big debate about picking times,” he explained. “The harvest in Vosne-Romanée was very spread out over a three-week period. Some people waited because they thought the skins were not ripe, which was true in the first week of September. But some fruit got overripe quickly during the second week.”

Still, Méo told me that he can't find a fault in the 2015 vintage. “The wines are dense, ripe, fresh and fruity, with great balance and generosity, and they show the terroir.” He described 2015 as “a blend of 2009 and 2005: higher in acidity than 2009 and slightly riper than 2005. It’s an especially strong vintage for village wines; the others will need time. The big wines of the vintage may need refining with age but they’re not overly closed now,” he added. Like a number of his colleagues, Méo believes that the '15s "won't necessarily go through a long closed period.”

Méo, who has cut back on both punchdowns and pumpovers in recent years, is also minimizing racking; in fact, although the malos finished in July, he had only racked a few wines as of mid-November. The samples Méo prepared were approximations of the final blends, which feature 20% to 25% new oak for the village wines and 33% for the premier crus.