I met with Peter, Blair, Philip and Karl two weeks ago at Troquet to taste through some bottles of Clos St Jacques. As usual, the food and service were outstanding and I really liked having the huge Burg stems for these beauties.
Starters:
N.V. Larmandier-Bernier Champagne Extra-Brut Blanc de Blancs. I’ve not tried this before, but this Champagne I find to be right in my wheelhouse. The nose is bright and vociferous, with a wide-open and giving feel to it—featuring aromas of smoke, lavender, brioche, sweet chalk/candy cigarette, dark honey and lemon peel. It is wonderfully full, creamy and complex—and just feels so “present” on the palate. In the mouth, it is similarly vibrant and fresh, yet creamy, layered and caressing. It has great density and really fills the whole mouth with flavor, but it is also chiseled and muscled around the edges in a way that lets the soft pleasures slide right through. It turns more focused and mineral-laden toward the finish, especially as the night wears on. An excellent start!
1985 Jean Bourdy Cotes du Jura Blanc. This has a really interesting gold/orange color to it that is burnished but bright. It is a fascinating wine to smell, starting out with aromas of red flowers and berries but soon beginning to show off more of its oxidative qualities such as toasted walnuts, honeycomb, pistachio, copper kettle and pine resin. It changes and morphs seemingly after every swirl in the glass, eventually settling into a saline and nutty vein, but with twinges of botrytis brown spices popping up every once in a while. It is a wild ride. In the mouth, it is quite strong on the acidity, but not tinny or pinched or anything. It seems to taste of nuts, sherry, brown spices and granola with blood oranges and cooked yellow peach slices on top if that makes any sense whatsoever. Despite all of this going on, it manages to never feel out of balance or too sharply acidic—a really intellectual pleasure to follow over the course of an evening.
We then dug into the reds in the following order:
1990 Michel Esmonin & Fille Gevrey-Chambertin 1er Cru Clos St. Jacques. My goodness, does this smell nice! For a few moments, I just lose myself in the ethereal bouquet that rises up out of the glass and when I finally open my eyes, I see a bunch of smiles starting to form around the table as we all just start nodding our heads like “yeah, that’s the stuff!”. Descriptors like wilting rose petals, soft red berries, plush suede, black tea, butterscotch and gentle sous bois notes barely do it justice. In the mouth, it is full and rounded, with soft plush corners and oodles of super-ripe sour cherry fruit giving it a languid, seductive and enveloping feel. Some late tannins come in on the finish to remind one that this has some additional staying power. After a while, though, I do start to perhaps detect a bit of the heat from the vintage, so I’d be a bit careful on pushing it too far. Still, on any other night this has the seductive power to be an easy Wine of the Night. As it is, I had it as my runner-up.
1996 Michel Esmonin & Fille Gevrey-Chambertin 1er Cru Clos St. Jacques. This is a darker, denser color than the 1990 and initially seems a touch more modern-styled. Eventually, though, I conclude that it’s really quite similarly-profiled at the core—just younger. It smells of dark red flowers, wild berries and rich cherries, peaty earth and some appealing balsamic notes. It builds incrementally over the course of the evening and holds on strong all the while to its core of dark red fruit and earth tones. In the mouth, the wine is ripe and smoky, with a darker, more earth-bound personality than the 1990. There is a good deal of stuffing here and a definite fullness of flavor I find appealing. It has a youthful but seamless core and seems to be sitting on a good deal of delicious raw material. A fine squirt of acidity comes on toward the finish and gives a nice freshness to it, too. Overall, though, this is in a more “serious” phase right now, but I do have to say that it really impresses me with the way it slowly evolves over the night and never shows any let-up. I think with some extra air time up front, this would have shown better earlier, but I’m a fan either way.
1997 Domaine Armand Rousseau Père et Fils Gevrey-Chambertin 1er Cru Clos St. Jacques. This is a fabulous effort all around. The nose is utterly gorgeous in a plush, fuzzy and aromatically enveloping way. It entrances with its scents of maraschino cherry, cedar dust, cinnamon, flowers, spice and downy earth—all accented by a gentle streak of spearmint that I think everyone at the table picks up on. It’s just multi-dimensional goodness here. In the mouth, this is where the wine really sets itself apart, in my opinion. It may not be quite as fanned out as the 1990 Esmonin, but it has lovely rounded acidity and delicious red cherry and berry fruit that has a certain cushiony silken feel despite all the flavor it effortlessly delivers. The caressing after-taste lingers for a very long time and overall this wine just hits all the heights. My WOTN.
1999 Domaine Bruno Clair Gevrey-Chambertin 1er Cru Clos St. Jacques. The nose here shows a lot of bark, twig, fern and raw green stem notes that I am not a big fan of. Thankfully, beneath that one can find a good deal of pleasant black cherry fruit, as well. In the mouth, this just doesn’t demonstrate the class or feminine charms of the other wines on the table. Instead, it goes for and succeeds with a profile that demonstrates intense drive and energy and youthful exuberance. I wouldn’t call it primary, just tautly focused as it powers ahead with its blacker-fruited profile of black currants, patent leather and black licorice that feels like an anomaly in this line-up. Maybe it just needs a good deal more time?
2002 Domaine Bruno Clair Gevrey-Chambertin 1er Cru Clos St. Jacques. The bouquet of this 2002 is return to the pretty profile of red flowers, soft spices and gentle inviting berries of the first set of CSJ’s. It shows a great purity of cherry fruit, as well, that while not quite as nuanced or sensual as those offerings, it makes up for it with impressive power allied to class. In the mouth, I actually find this a bit reminiscent of the ’96 Esmonin in its taut youthful feel and long tight-knit finish. It hasn’t found its top gear yet, but it does get juicier and juicier and more and more impressive as the night goes along. There is no real tannic interference, but a good deal of structure and grippy character that makes it real nice tonight but promises better things ahead.
1985 Bruno Giacosa Barbaresco Riserva Santo Stefano. Toward the end of the evening, a few of the guys from the next table over sent a generous-sized pour of this over. It has a powerful nose of tar oil, cedar, black leather, ash and gardenia flowers. It is really youthful and aromatically intense, and that carries through to the palate, where it feels like it’s still a bit of a baby in a lot of ways. Flavors of black cherry and tar are buttressed by strong tannins and acidity and just feel like they have a long way to go.
-Michael