Tasting Notes
Burghound 93
A wonderfully elegant and gorgeously pure nose of earthy red berry fruit, spice and a hint of game gives way to rich, full and powerful flavors that are textured, intense, minerally and well muscled while culminating in a focused, detailed and driving finish. This won’t go down as the greatest of Jadot Bonnes Mares but it’s indisputably an impressive effort, particularly in the context of the vintage. It will also offer the benefit of a vintage that will be approachable in 10 to 12 years, which is precocious by the standards of this wine.
Vinous 93+
Good bright, full red. Highly nuanced nose combines briary raspberry and strawberry, mocha, brown spices, minerals and underbrush. Sweet on entry, then quite tight in the middle and dominated by its structure in the early going. But aeration brings a strong impression of dusty extract and terroir-accurate notes of red berries, menthol, licorice and underbrush. Finishes long and subtle, with a lovely light touch and a piquant suggestion of rhubarb. This will require a good seven or eight years of cellaring to express itself.
Wine Advocate 92
Sourced from only the former Clair vineyards on the Morey side rather than incorporating fruit from the Chambolle side (which has now reverted to Bruno Clair), Jadot’s 2007 Bonnes Mares delivers the intensity of black raspberry one is tempted to call a oebramblya and that involves a vivid impression of biting down on the seeds of red raspberry and inhaling the scents of underbrush. Notes of sage, vanilla, tamarind, and licorice add pungent complexity to a well-concentrated and finely-tannic palate, and this finishes with lingering sweetness, scintillating interplay, and a foundation of damp stone and forest floor. I suspect there will be considerable reward from following it over the next dozen or more years. Jacques Lardiere reported that selection to remove grapes tainted with rot had to be rigorous in both 2007 and 2008, but that the task was more onerous in 2008, and especially in the Cote de Beaune. A substantial share of the triage in the Cote de Nuits, he noted, was for the sake or removing under-ripe berries, and in the end less than one degree of chaptalization took place with any Jadot 2008 or 2007 red. Given the biodynamic methods now employed here, anti-botryticides are anathema, which would, one suspects, have enhanced the challenges presented in both years, but especially in 2007. The best Jadot 2008s " many of which did not finish malo until after the 2009 harvest " possess energy and sheer refreshment, if occasionally accompanied by slightly abrasive tannins and aggressive acids. What’s more, these 2008s are for the most part (by Cote d’Or standards) value-priced. The higher-priced 2007s " about which Lardiere waxed enthusiastic early in their evolution " frequently wanted somewhat for focus; sweetness of fruit; or distinctive personalities, with the exceptions being, sadly for consumers, among the most expensive crus. While Jadot’s Cote de Beaune 2007s were harvested earlier and vinified more cautiously due to their more precarious condition than were the corresponding Cote de Nuits lots, I found worrisome astringency creeping into some of the latter, and not the sort that I expect to dissipate. Fans of Clos des Ursules who maintain a vertical collection should be aware that the team here elected to bottle the small amount of 2007 (which I did not taste) exclusively in magnum. Given the extremely reasonable pricing of Jadot wines in recent years " owned by their importer, they no doubt enjoy a unique degree of flexibility thanks to vertical integration " the many excellent Jadot 2005s (for cellaring) and 2006s that remain in the marketplace are where I would look for some of Burgundy’s best Pinot values. None of the Jadot 2008s were bottled before March, but I re-tasted some of them in late April after they had been bottled, which explains the presence of limited non-parenthetic ratings. The extent of declassification or anticipated declassification in the interest of quality in 2008 spoke volumes about Jadot’s quality-consciousness, but rendered a few of the samples I tasted " even last April "indicative of vintage quality here as a whole, rather only vaguely indicative of the wines that would eventually be bottled under a given village-designated label. For example, I tasted a village Pommard representative of an assemblage of 60 barrels, but into this Lardiere planned to blend no fewer than 20-25 barrels from assorted Pommard premier crus. There will also be a village Beaune for the U.S. market, incidentally, assembled from barrels of premier cru, but also not yet assembled when I tasted. Importer: Kobrand, Inc., New York, NY; tel.(212) 490-9300
JancisRobinson.com 18.0
The Bonnes Mares vineyard lies at the edge of Chambolle-Musigny, and occupies 15ha of which almost four spill into Morey-St-Denis. In this area, the calcium content of the soil, which gives the wines of Chambolle- Musigny their great delicacy, is less pronounced, and compared to Le Musigny, Bonnes-Mares is more robust, yet still extremely elegant. Domaine Louis Jadot controls 1.6ha, which include the entire Morey-Saint-Denis parcel, in the Bonnes-Mares climat, of which 0.6ha were acquired with the majority of the Domaine Clair Dau holdings in 1985, with 1 hectare under long-term contract. Lots of sweet and fragrant fruit with good depth and weight on the palate, particularly in this vintage. Juicy energy and very good length. (JH)
Anticipated maturity: 2012-2022
