Winemaker Notes
A bold and full-bodied wine, full in the mouth with dried fruit flavours; mineral and harmonious.
Professional Ratings
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Decanter
Another Marc Morey wine that's returning after a frost-induced break in 2016, this is a delicate, refined Chassagne from Sabine Mollard with fresh, white flower and blossom aromas, scented oak, some baking spice sweetness and a core of pithy, zesty acidity.
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James Suckling
A steely edge to the pithy grapefruit and lemon aromas with stony and slightly flinty nuances. The palate has a very precise and fresh, taut feel. Great, succulent fruit with driving acidity. A lot of pleasure here. Super minerally. Drink or hold.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
One of the more youthfully accessible wines in the range is the 2017 Chassagne-Montrachet 1er Cru Les Vergers, a pretty wine that opens in the glass with scents of honeyed pear, white flowers, orange oil and toasted nuts. Medium to full-bodied, satiny and charming, with fine depth at the core and racy balancing acids, it concludes with a long and nicely defined finish. This is well worth seeking out.
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Wine & Spirits
This wine smells like a grand cru, its upfront power layering fennel scents with fresh buttery pie crust and lemon. It doesn’t quite deliver on the depth you might anticipate from that seductive aroma, but still, it’s bold, juicy and generous, a wine to enjoy five to six years from the vintage, with roast veal in a creamy sauce.
One of the most popular and versatile white wine grapes, Chardonnay offers a wide range of flavors and styles depending on where it is grown and how it is made. While it tends to flourish in most environments, Chardonnay from its Burgundian homeland produces some of the most remarkable and longest lived examples. California produces both oaky, buttery styles and leaner, European-inspired wines. Somm Secret—The Burgundian subregion of Chablis, while typically using older oak barrels, produces a bright style similar to the unoaked style. Anyone who doesn't like oaky Chardonnay would likely enjoy Chablis.
A Côte de Beaune village of Burgundy most famous for its beautifully textured and powerful whites, Chassagne-Montrachet reaches farthest south in the Côte d’Or, save for the village of Santenay. It has three Grands Crus vineyards: Le Montrachet, Bâtard-Montrachet and Criots-Bâtard-Montrachet. Le Montrachet and Bâtard-Montrachet overlap with and are (confusingly) shared with the village of Puligny-Montrachet. But Chassagne-Montrachet bears sole ownership of the Criots-Bâtard-Montrachet Grand Cru.
The beauty doesn’t stop there as the village has a great many outstanding Premiers Crus wines and village level wines. Most famous Premiers Crus vineyards include Les Chenevottes, Clos de la Maltroie, En Cailleret and Les Ruchottes. Also, village level wines offer many lovely examples of what Chassagne-Montrachet has to offer, but at more approachable price points and perhaps less demand of waiting.
The best sites in Chassagne-Montrachet have complex soils of sedimentary rock and limestone (with less marl). Whites, which are by law composed of 100% Chardonnay (as in all classified white Burgundy from Côte d’Or), have steely power, bright and concentrated citrus, stone or tropical fruit characteristics and attractive textures ranging from plush to tactile, grippy and mineral-driven.
There is some fine Pinot Noir produced from the village. These wines tend to be high-toned and earthy, with wild herb aromas and suave tannins.