2004 Chablis Les Clos Grand Cru

This superb producer had just begun harvesting its grand cru Les Preuses on September 13, the day before my visit here, or five days before Maison Bouchard was set to begin its white wine harvest on the Cote de Beaune. While we tasted, the large team of pickers was attacking the Valmur (under the Henriot ownership, there are as many as 200 pickers, and many of them were scheduled to be trucked to Beaune to start harvesting on the 18th). Winemaker Didier Seguier, by all accounts making some of the most brilliant wines in Chablis in recent years, picked early and quickly in 2005, and was able mostly to avoid getting grapes with golden skins and rot problems. Rain at the end of August brought botrytis in some spots, reported Seguier, especially on vines that had been affected by hail in July. The result was some surmaturite, which raised grape sugars to 14% or even higher in some spots. Seguier describes 2005 as a vin de garde, with good acidity and no dilution. But the 2004s will have excellent ageability too, he added: "Due to the age of our vines, we didn't get a huge crop." Fevre's 2005 premier crus had been bottled at the time of my visit, but the house was just starting on its grand crus, and a few were not slated for bottling until November.

.My marathon tasting here was one of the highlights of my quick tour of Chablis.As classic as the 2004s are at this address, the 2003s are equally impressive for the number of wines that transcend this freakishly hot vintage.Incidentally, winemaker Didier Seguier was one of several Chablis insiders who thought the low vintage rating of 2004 published in the magazine Bourgogne Aujourd'hui was nonsense.He rates 2002 18 out of 20, while 2003 merits 14 and 2004 is a solid 16 (my own ratings would be quite close to his, perhaps a hair lower for the '03s).Typically, about half of each premier cru at William Fevre spends its first six to eight months in barrels before the wines are blended in tank and aged for another six months or so.In vintage 2004, noted Seguier, only 20 of this producer's 800 barrels were new.