Mongeard-Mugneret Vosne-Romanee Les Orveaux Premier Cru 2016
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Jeb
Dunnuck -
Wine
Spectator -
Robert
Parker
Product Details
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Somm Note
Winemaker Notes
o The wonderful exposure enjoyed by the Vosne Romane´e Premier Cru En Orveaux vineyard endows these wines with a deep ruby color and aromas of red fruits, black currants, and raspberries. Their robust and richly perfumed bouquet imbues them with a character that is at once silky and rustic. Their freshness and mellowness, combined with a certain sensuous vinosity, renders them a worthy rival to other Vosne-Romane´e premier crus. This is a supremely well-balanced wine.
Professional Ratings
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Jeb Dunnuck
The 2016 Vosne-Romanée 1er Cru Les Orveaux offers more density and depth, with beautiful black raspberry, spring flowers, sappy herbs, and earthy, peppery, sous bois-like characteristics. It has medium body, bright, juicy acidity, ultra-fine tannins, and a terrific finish, and is a perfumed, complex Vosne-Romanée to drink over the coming 10-15 years.
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Wine Spectator
Rich, with a hint of milk chocolate framing the core of cherry, rose, spice and mineral flavors. There is fine saturation and balance overall, this just requires time to come together. Best from 2021 through 2038. 80 cases imported.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2016 Vosne-Romanée 1er Cru En Orveaux is showing well, bursting with already expressive aromas of blackberries, raspberries, menthol, warm spices and smoked meats. On the palate, the wine is medium to full-bodied, ample and succulent, with a fleshy, enveloping core of fruit, supple tannins and a nicely defined finish. This is a charming, gourmand and nicely balanced Orveaux that will offer a broad drinking window.
Other Vintages
2019-
Robert
Parker
The Mongeard family arrived in Vosne-Romanée in the eighteenth century, with records showing a Mongeard working as vigneron for Domaine de la Romanée-Conti in 1786. In 1945, Jean Mongeard, whose mother was a Mugneret, found himself making wine at the age of 16 in the place of his father who had died years earlier. The entire 1945 crop was purchased by Baron le Roy, Marquis d’Angerville, and Henri Gouges. Gouges instructed the young Mongeard to personally bottle the wines, rather than sell in barrel. In 1975, Vincent Mongeard, Jean’s son, began working alongside his father and became responsible for viticulture and vinification of the domaine’s wines. He persuaded his father to return to the traditional method of bottling, without filtration, filtering only with certain vintages. Jean Mongeard retired in 1995, and Vincent assumed complete leadership of the domaine. Today, Domaine Mongeard-Mugneret covers a total area of more than 75 acres, split among 35 appellations. The varied range of climats in which the Mongeards own vineyards results, naturally, in wines of great diversity.
Thin-skinned, finicky and temperamental, Pinot Noir is also one of the most rewarding grapes to grow and remains a labor of love for some of the greatest vignerons in Burgundy. Fairly adaptable but highly reflective of the environment in which it is grown, Pinot Noir prefers a cool climate and requires low yields to achieve high quality. Outside of France, outstanding examples come from in Oregon, California and throughout specific locations in wine-producing world. Somm Secret—André Tchelistcheff, California’s most influential post-Prohibition winemaker decidedly stayed away from the grape, claiming “God made Cabernet. The Devil made Pinot Noir.”
This is the village for the most die-hard Burgundy fanatics. Vosne-Romanée has for many hundreds of years been the source of the most sought-after Pinot Noir in Burgundy. The village claims six Grands Crus—and some of the most famous at that—but in other villages where owners manage tiny parcels or a few rows of any one vineyard, monopolies dominate the Grands Crus of Vosne-Romanee.
Of these monopolies, Domaine Romanee-Conti (DRC) reigns supreme, claiming not only more total vineyard area than any other producer, but outright owning the entirety of two of the Grands Crus and a majority of two others. In its full possession are naturally Romanée-Conti, as well as La Tâche. DRC also owns most of Richebourg and Romanée-St-Vivant. The final two, La Grande Rue and La Romanée are completely owned by other other produers: François Lamarche and Comte Liger Belair, respectively.
While one could spend a lifetime on the puzzles of land ownership in Burgundy, the point is that Vosne-Romanee contains the most valuable pieces of vineyard real estate in the world. Pinot Noir from any of its vineyards—especially from within its 27ha of Grand Cru or 58 ha of Premier Cru land—is going to rank among the best.
The most outstanding wines from this village have everything: finesse and elegance coupled with the body and sturdiness for incredibly long aging ability. They are intensely floral and exotically spiced. Beautifully ripe, complex and ephemeral throughout, they are robust, yet fine-grained in texture. These wines will stay gorgeous for the long haul.