Domaine Dujac Clos Saint-Denis Grand Cru 2004 bottle - Vins Rare

91-93 BH

Notes:

Tasting note: Fairly strong reduction makes this somewhat difficult to read aromatically though the flavors are exceptionally fresh and bright with a rich, sweet and punchy character and plenty of finishing energy and vibrancy. This is notably well balanced, possesses outstanding raw material and should age well. Burghound 91-93Producer note: There is now a three person team in charge of the wine making at Dujac and is composed of founder Jacques Seysses, his son Jeremy (who is also responsible for the Fils et Pre and the white wines), and Jeremy's new bride Diana, an American who is a trained enologist as well. Jacques told me that "things were pretty sad in August. The growing season hadn't been very promising and there had been several hail storms, in fact 3 in Gevrey. We took some risks in harvesting this year by rearranging our usual order to try and get the very best ripeness we could. We noticed for some years now that those vines that are clones tend to ripen early whereas the old vines ripen later and thus we harvest some parcels twice. We didn't even start picking until September 27th and delayed starting the whites until October 4th. We did a severe triage but mainly because of the hail as we really didn't have any problems with oidium. Sugars were good and came in around 13% and there was essentially no chaptalization. Otherwise, we did a normal vinification with around 3 days of cold maceration and the destemming regimen was between zero and 20%. We elected to punch down more early and less later as we wanted to extract more tannins and color in an aqueous solution rather than in the presence of a higher percentage of alcohol. For me, 2004 is a blend of 2000 and 2002." Note that there is, for the time being, no Bonnes Mares in 2003 as the reduction is so strong even in bottle that the Seysses team decided to hold it back. It's possible that it will be released at a later date, depending on how it develops in bottle.The Dujac team has also been busy behind the scenes as it, along with a small syndicate of investors and another group headed by Etienne de Montille, has purchased some 30+ ha of vineyard from Domaine Thomas-Moillard. The details are not completely final as there are still on-going negotiations with the dreaded French governmental agency SAFER as well as some intra-group discussions as to which entities are assuming responsibility for precisely how much of each respective appellation. At the time of my November visit, it appears (subject to possible change) that Domaine Dujac will now be producing approximately 5 barrels of Chambertin (the parcels are in both Chambertin and Clos de Bze), 2 to 2 1/2 barrels of Romane St. Vivant, up to 25 of Malconsorts (this vineyard in particular is the subject of on-going negotiation), 2 more of Bonnes Mares and 9 more of Les Beaux Monts. As some readers know, I at one time used to structure often very complicated merger and acquisition agreements in a prior life and based on what Jacques Seysses explained to me, I can report without fear of contradiction that this is one exceptionally intricate deal with almost innumerable parties to the transaction. As I noted, we'll see if it all comes together but it's an exciting prospect to see the Dujac team have the opportunity to craft wines from new appellations. The first vintage for these wines will be 2005. I'll report on the de Montille side in the next Issue though as I understand it from Etienne de Montille, they will produce two cuves Malconsorts, a regular one and another from a parcel that sits "inside" what would seemingly be a rational demarcation of La Tche; if you're having difficult envisioning what I mean, grab a map of Vosne-Romane and you'll immediately see what I mean. (Wilson-Daniels Ltd., St. Helena, CA and Chambers & Chambers, San Francisco, CA for southern California; Morris & Verdin, O.W. Loeb, Howard Ripley, Uncorked Ltd and Lay & Wheeler, UK).

Vins Rare