Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
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Decanter
This complex, satisfying wine is redolent of ripe nectarine and passion fruit, with a hint of smoky reduction and a leesy edge. The texture is waxy and deep, but there is enough acidity to bring everything back into balance, which is why I preferred the 2023 to the 2022. The grapes are from 0.6ha of old vines. For optimal results, cellar this wine for two or three years before opening and drink it over the next decade.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
Aromas of white flowers, peach, toasted nuts and buttery pastry preface the 2023 Saint-Aubin 1er Cru Les Champlots, a medium- to full-bodied, ample and fine-boned wine that's mineral and ethereal in style.
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 steep, upcountry basin (referred to as a combe in French) in the southern end of the Côte de Beaune, St. Aubin is a direct westerly neighbor to Chassagne-Montrachet and Puligny-Montrachet. Recent years have seen a boom in white wine production so that now Chardonnay accounts for more than three quarters of area under vine here. Two thirds of St. Aubin is classified Premier Cru (30 total vineyards); most notable include Les Charmois, La Chatenière, En Remilly and Les Murgers Dents de Chie. The Premiers Crus of St. Aubin, wrapping like a ribbon upon the southeast and southwest facing slopes, produce fresh and elegant whites from Chardonnay. When young, these tout a refreshing grip and convey qualities of white flowers, citrus, pear, green almond and wet stone. Given some age, a graceful evolution occurs so that older St. Aubin whites express richer aromas of beeswax, honey, marzipan and spice.