2005 Puligny-Montrachet

"I started making wine in 1953 and 2006 brought the highest grape sugars I've ever seen," said veteran Paul Pernot. The crus are just under 14%, he added, and acidity levels are in the rather low 3.6 to 3.8 grams-per-liter range, without acidification. The 2006s were in barrels on their finings when I tasted them at the beginning of June, and Pernot planned to bottle them all at the beginning of July. Pernot believes that 2005 is the more classic vintage for him. "You can drink these wines after two or three years but they will age," he averred. (Louis/Dressner Selections, New York, NY; Robert Chadderdon Selections, New York, NY; also brought into the U.S. as a Peter Vezan Selection and through Domaines et Saveurs/Jeanne-Marie de Champs)

Veteran winemaker Pernot described 2005 as a year with perfect maturity."I've never seen anything like it.We had a long, slow maturation, and the grapes were able to retain sound acidity."The crop was of an average size:in the range of 40 to 45 hectoliters per hectare for the crus.Pernot started by picking pinot noir, but he pointed out that he waited until five days after the ban de vendange to start harvesting.Pernot's white wines typically finish their malos early, and have been racked and sulfited long before I taste them in late spring, but he noted that the 2005s took longer to finish than the 2004s did a year ago.Incidentally, Pernot listed yet another possible contributing factor to premature oxidation in white Burgundy:today's gentler presses."In years like '95 and '89, these presses don't crush the millerande grapes, and so the wines don't have as much acidity as they should."Pernot added that his problem vintage was 1995, and that he has had very good luck with his '96s.(Louis/Dressner Selections, New York, NY; Robert Chadderdon Selections, New York, NY; also brought into the U.S. as a Peter Vezan Selection and through Domaines et Saveurs/Jeanne-Marie de Champs)