Brace of Burgundy

The Roaders came to visit.  We visited them over a year ago, so it was a long overdue get-together.  They are burgundy wine nuts, so of course they shared a brace of bottles with some bottle age on them, and from a pretty good vintage.  One white and one red, and both faring differently, of course.

The 2005 J-P & B Droin Chablis 1er ‘Vaillons’ was full and broad with a voluminous bouquet and mouthfilling palate.  Now a bit oft, and quite rounded, the flavours were strong in presence, but the classical flint.  Is this sea-shell limestone and terroir?  Or winemaker input with lees contact now beginning to grow and possibly swamp the fruit?  Maybe both.  It polarised us, some liking the wine, others not so keen.  I was in the former group, after all the wine is a decade in age now, and such breath and roundness is to be expected.  What about the crisp Chablis expression?  Not there for me, and the loss of the zingy freshness of Chablis of old seems to be symptomatic of climate change, some say.

Much more mysterious was the 2005 Tollot-Beaut Corton-Bressandes Grand Cru, served blind.  SWMBO and I were on the same page: Cote de Beaune rather than Cote de Nuits, and Corton over Volnay and Pommard.  We didn’t know who made it, and SWMBO was correct on the vintage of 2005, I guessed 1999.  Some browning, but very elegant, with some secondary, savoury complexities.  Beautifully fine acidity, and the tannins growing on the palate to show its class and grand cru status.  There’s no hurry with this one, for sure.  We were all happy with this…