2015 Chablis Butteaux Vieilles Vignes 1er Cru
00
2020 - 2026
Subscriber Access Only
or Sign Up
You'll Find The Article Name Here
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Integer vitae aliquam odio. Aliquam purus diam, tempor et consectetur vitae, eleifend ac quam. Proin nec mauris ac odio iaculis semper. Integer posuere pharetra aliquet. Nullam tincidunt sagittis est in maximus. Donec sem orci, vulputate ac quam non, consectetur fermentum diam. In dignissim magna id orci dignissim convallis. Integer sit amet placerat dui. Aliquam pharetra ornare nulla at vulputate. Sed dictum, mi eget fringilla lacinia, nisl tortor condimentum mi, vitae ultrices quam diam ac neque. Donec hendrerit vulputate felis, fringilla varius massa.
- By Author Name on Month Date, Year
Guillaume Gicqueau-Michel described 2016 as a nightmare vintage. “The good news is that the wines are good; the bad news is that there’s no wine,” he told me. This estate made just half a crop in 2016, but quantities were off more like 70% in their village and Petit Chablis holdings (the grand crus were down about 30%). Gicqueau-Michel describes the young 2016s as “fleshy and balanced,” despite low acidity levels of 3.2 to 3.8 grams per liter. “As with the 2015s, you don’t feel the lack of acidity in the 2016s,” he went on. “The ‘16s are a bit more linear and the ‘15s a bit richer; there’s more salinity in 2015 and more tension in 2016.” The estate started harvesting on September 27 with potential alcohols at 12.2% or 12.3% and picked quickly; some wines were lightly chaptalized. All of the 2016s were in tanks at the time of my early June visit.
Incidentally, Gicqueau-Michel told me that the 2015s had sugars similar to the 2016s “before and after chaptalization.” He added that vintages 2014, 2013 and 2012 were all higher in potential alcohol than the two most recent years and required less chaptalization. (He's telling his customers to drink their 2013s now, and then the 2015s.) The 2015 grand crus had been bottled about three weeks before my visit.
00
Subscriber Access Only
or Sign Up
You'll Find The Article Name Here
Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetur adipiscing elit. Integer vitae aliquam odio. Aliquam purus diam, tempor et consectetur vitae, eleifend ac quam. Proin nec mauris ac odio iaculis semper. Integer posuere pharetra aliquet. Nullam tincidunt sagittis est in maximus. Donec sem orci, vulputate ac quam non, consectetur fermentum diam. In dignissim magna id orci dignissim convallis. Integer sit amet placerat dui. Aliquam pharetra ornare nulla at vulputate. Sed dictum, mi eget fringilla lacinia, nisl tortor condimentum mi, vitae ultrices quam diam ac neque. Donec hendrerit vulputate felis, fringilla varius massa.
- By Author Name on Month Date, Year
Guillaume Gicqueau-Michel told me that the September 1 hail affected 90% of the estate, sparing only Vaudésir, Grenouilles and Petit Chablis , but adding that in Clos the only impact was on the leaves. He was planning to start harvesting around September 6 but quickly reorganized to begin on September 3. “The unaffected estates came to help us with their harvesting machines,” he told me, and within the first two and a half days, half of the estate’s fruit had been pressed. (Michel picks its grand crus, Butteaux Vieilles Vignes, Séchets and Vaulorent by hand.) “We did 13 three-hour presses on the first day,” he added. “If the hail had come two weeks earlier [i.e., before the grapes had achieved adequate ripeness], I’d have no wine to show you.” All of the 2015s had been racked and sulfated after a bentonite fining the week before my visit, which made tasting them a challenge.
The ‘15s have considerably lower acidity than the 2014s—typically between 3.5 and 3.7 grams per liter, vs. 4.3 to 4.7—“but they feel fresher than that and show some tension,” said Gicqueau-Michel. Before the hail we were worrying about high alcohol levels but the hail and rain storm reduced potential alcohol by about one degree. “At the beginning, the Montée de Tonnerre and Forêts came in at 11.7%; they would have been at 13% without the hail,” he went on. “By day three of the harvest, sugars were more like 12.2% or 12.3% and they went higher after that, with the Vaudésir picked late, at 12.6%. He did not keep the lees in 2015 because he felt that the wines were already fat enough. And the natural-yeast fermentations went on for three or four months, which he said was “like a natural batonnage.”