2015 Chapelle-Chambertin Grand Cru

Rose-Marie Ponsot, who had run this renowned family estate with her brother (and winemaker) Laurent Ponsot since 1997, has now taken over sole responsibility since Laurent left in 2017 to begin his own négociant venture with his son Clément. For the time being, Laurent has retained his former métayage contracts on several vineyards belonging to the Mercier family, owners of Domaine des Chézeaux (in Clos Saint-Denis, Chambertin, Griottes-Chambertin and Chambolle-Musigny Les Charmes), and he will purchase fruit from other vineyards, including several Chardonnay parcels on the Côte de Beaune. The rest of the Ponsot family (Laurent has three sisters and he still has a 25% share of the family estate) will keep all of the original domain vines, although the final shape of the split has yet to be negotiated.

Rose-Marie Ponsot hired Alexandre Abel as winemaker, and he made the ‘17s at the family estate. Laurent was responsible for making the ’15s and ’16s that I tasted at Domaine Ponsot in January, but Abel took over the élevage of the latter set of wines. I asked Rose-Marie and Alexandre if the style of wine here could be expected to change in the near future, but they responded that they planned to maintain “the Ponsot style.” In fact, Abel examined the family archives going back to 1956 and discovered that even back then, Jean-Marie Ponsot (who died in 2017) harvested two or three weeks later than virtually all of his neighbors in Morey-Saint-Denis, in search of full maturity. (Laurent Ponsot only started harvesting in 2016 on October 4, and he waited until September 19 in 2017, a hot, early growing season in which most estates began picking during the first week of September.) “We don’t need more freshness in our wines,” noted Abel, “and we want to avoid getting any harshness or greenness.” Nor does the estate employ any new oak barrels; on the contrary, the youngest barrels they use are two years old and some of them date back to the late 1980s. Abel, who previously worked in Chile, South Africa and the Languedoc, will continue the practice of using very little SO2—only after the malolactic fermentations and just before the bottling.

As Laurent did, Abel generally avoids heavy extraction. He simply puts the berries in the tanks and does one or two quick pumpovers on the first day just to mix the tank. He then does one or two “small” pigeages during the first part of the fermentation, which can start quickly when ambient temperatures are warm. (He’ll warm the tanks when temperatures are cool, which is more likely given how late the estate harvests.) He then punches down the cap in the morning and afternoon for the next five days, then switches to a daily pumpover, racking the wines off their skins as soon as the fermentations have finished, and sometimes carrying out a délestage. Fermentation temperatures may mount as high as 31 or 32 degrees C. during the last couple days, and total maceration time is normally just 7 to 10 days but can go up to 15.

Abel finds 2016 to be a red fruit vintage, while 2015 is more black. Potential alcohol levels were in the lofty 13.5% to 14% range in ’16, but the pHs following the malos are a very moderate 3.3 to 3.4, vs. 3.4 to 3.6 for the ‘15s. “The ‘16s have great fruit and energy and very good balance,” he told me in January. “They’re very Pinot. The 2015s will probably need more time but they have bit more potential. But the ’16s also have significant potential. It’s not just a fresh, easy-drinking vintage.”