Winemaker Notes
Professional Ratings
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Decanter
Globetrotting Philippe Colin may be based in Chassagne-Montrachet, but he's not averse to travelling to South Africa or even neighbouring Puligny-Montrachet for that matter, where he owns 0.28ha of this grand cru. The 2017 is rich, sappy and waxy, a focussed and deftly oaked wine with notes of orange zest and waxed lemons.
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Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The 2017 Chevalier-Montrachet Grand Cru is immensely promising, unfurling in the glass with an appropriately reserved nose of lemon oil, candle wax, white currants, toasted bread and dried spring flowers. On the palate, the wine is full-bodied, deep and layered with a satiny attack, excellent concentration at the core and a long, expansive finish. This must number among the best kept secrets in grand cru white Burgundy, and I encourage readers to seek it out.
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Wine Spectator
Toasted brioche, baking spice and butterscotch aromas and flavors surround the core of peach, golden apple and hazelnut in this extroverted white. There’s plenty going on, including excellent harmony and a vibrant structure that will support this for years. Best from 2021 through 2029. From France.
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 source of some of the finest, juicy, silky and elegantly floral Chardonnay in the Côte de Beaune, Puligny-Montrachet lies just to the north of Chassagne-Montrachet, a village with which it shares two of its Grands Crus vineyards: Le Montrachet itself and Bâtard-Montrachet. Its other two, which it owns in their entirety, are Chevalier-Montrachet and Bienvenues-Bâtard-Montrachet. And still, some of the finest white Burgundy wines come from the prized Premiers Crus vineyards of Puligny-Montrachet. To name a few, Les Pucelles, Le Clavoillon, Les Perrières, Les Referts and Les Combettes, as well as the rest, lie northeast and up slope from the Grands Crus.
Farther to the southeast are village level whites and the hamlet of Blagny where Pinot Noir grows best and has achieved Premier Cru status.