2016 Chambertin Grand Cru

“What does 2016 lack?” I asked Christophe Perrot-Minot in November. “Quantity,” he responded, “and some ripeness, too, in the parcels affected by frost.” The maturity came late in 2016, and Perrot-Minot did multiple harvests in some vineyards, then eliminated the less-ripe fruit on the sorting table. “Some vines supported the frost better than others, and despite the small crop there were problems with ripeness,” he told me.

Perrot-Minot, whose business model depends on selling highly concentrated wines from carefully controlled yields at relatively high prices, told me he could not bring himself to bottle anything but a village wine from Chambolle-Musigny “because the stunted ripeness from the frost meant that I couldn’t make anything with the range of aromas that one expects to find in a premier cru.” He went on: “Even if the warm summer shrunk the big gap in ripeness, the fruit wasn’t expressive enough.” Of course, the result will be a terrific village Chambolle with uncommon sap and perfume.

Perrot-Minot lost 80% of his Chambolle crop overall but more like 30% to 40% elsewhere. He started harvesting on September 23 with what he described as very variable grape sugars: 12.5% to 12.8% for the vines that escaped the frost but only about 12% for the frosted parcels. He vinified most of his '16s with about 50% whole clusters but that was only because he began by doing a careful selection of the best fruit. As is normally the case here, Perrot-Minot vinified via “infusion,” doing some remontages but very little in the way of pigeage. The ‘16s are aging in a maximum 20% new oak, but the rest of his barrels are just one or two years old.