Winemaker Notes
The greatest of all our Meursault wines. It has a mineral and crystalline initial bouquet. The terroir is omnipresent. Both fine and elegant, its powerful salinity awakens the taste buds. It is a vibrant, sapid, and exceptional wine, especially when opened after a few years.
Professional Ratings
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Jeb Dunnuck
Coming from 56-year-old vines and fermented and aged in barrel, the 2017 Meursault Perrières 1er Cru is a gem in the lineup and certainly delivers the goods. Offering a vivid bouquet of white flowers and stone and citrus fruits, beautiful wet stone and flinty minerality, and some salty seaside notes, it hits the palate with medium-bodied richness, racy yet integrated acidity, and a crisp, lengthy finish. It’s a brilliant, perfectly balanced Meursault that almost has a Chassagne-Montrachet-like purity and elegance.
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Wine Spectator
Buried aromas of lime blossom, yuzu, citronella and stone mark this austere, steely white. The racy structure and tension are exciting, driving the long finish of fruit, mineral and spice. All the components are in the right proportions, but this needs a little time to integrate. Best from 2021 through 2030.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
Revisited after a year in bottle, the 2017 Meursault 1er Cru Les Perrières confirms its promise, unwinding in the glass with scents of citrus oil, crisp green orchard fruit, honeysuckle, crushed chalk and beeswax. On the palate, the wine is medium to full-bodied, satiny and layered, its elegantly textural attack segueing into a vibrant, tightly wound core, concluding with a mineral finish. Matrot's parcel here is located between those of Jean-Marc Roulot and Armand Heitz.
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Wine & Spirits
A deep and satisfying Meursault, this wine has flavors that lead from hazelnut into ornate layers of animal (gamey white meat), vegetable (roots) and mineral (leesy energy). Its richness seems to emanate from its saturated core, and it lasts, suggesting the complexity this wine holds back for now is waiting to be released with bottle age.
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.
Known to offer a magical balance of smoothness and freshness, Meursault's quality is hard to rival. The village lies in the middle of Côte de Beaune, just south of Volnay. Meursault is said to mean “mouse’s jump” because in the past the plots producing Pinot Noir and those producing Chardonnay were no more than a mouse’s jump from one another. Today the village is almost exclusively Chardonnay. A tiny bit of Pinot Noir is produced here with the best coming from Les Santenots on its northern side near Volnay.
While there are no Grands Crus, Meursault’s numerous acclaimed Premiers Crus can compete with any other top-notch white Burgundy. Some to know are Les Perrières, Les Genevrières, Les Charmes, Le Poruzot, Les Bouchères and Les Gouttes d’Or.
Meursault produces outstanding village level wines as well. In general great Premiers Crus and even village level Meursault (Chardonnay) have enticing aromas of lime peel, tropical fruit, crushed rocks, spice and hazelnut. On the palate there is a wonderful balance of brightness and a seductive length with flavors of white peach, pineapple and citrus.