WTN: Hubert Lignier

[Jenise]

2000 Hubert Lignier Morey-St-Denis, Burgundy

At some point I had two bottles of this, and the first bottle about two years ago convinced me I'd left this village wine too long even though to my meager experience is that Lignier's wines usually drink above that level. That bottle was dried out, tart, blah, undrinkable. The death act was so convincing that I left this bottle in cool passive storage all this time, didn't even bother moving it to the cellar from the hall closet when we finished building the cellar.

Yesterday I opened it just so I could get rid of it. And of course, with this lead-in, you know I'm going to say that I instead found a lovely bottle of wine, which I did. It needed about an hour to shake some sulfurous stowaways, but when it did it gave the kind of heady aroma that somehow only Burgundy can have. Though we have, unfortunately, so little burgundy that we drink a bottle only about one every six months, Bob (drinking blind, as usual) picked it out immediately. Lovely ruby red color with an orange glint in the sunlight, spicy cherry aromas and a little caramel. The finish was a little short but all things considered, I'm not complaining. Very nice wine that, per my records, only cost me $30 and no domestic pinot can match it at that price point.

[David M. Bueker]

Ah Lignier - fabulous producer, now hopelessly overpriced, and in family struggles after the untimely death of the son who ran the winery. Pape and the son's widow DO NOT get along & the domaine may indeed end up being sold/broken up.

I still have a few Lignier bottles in the cellar & treasure them.

[Jenise]

David, so you're a fan, too? Not surprising. I discovered Lignier wines years ago during one of the Tuesday night dinners I used to attend with Jim Dietz. The subject grape was pinot noir, and a woman who came only that one time brought a '99 Lignier that she'd picked up at Hi Times on her way over. The California wines got the top votes from everyone else, but I voted with my feet the next day when I showed up at Hi Times. Unfortunately they only had a couple bottles left, and we enjoyed those over the following year. This pair I picked up later. I'm sad that it's my last bottle--it made me think I should quit buying domestic pinot altogether and buy Burg instead, even if that means I can afford fewer bottles.

[David M. Bueker]

David, so you're a fan, too?

Big fan. Sad fan.

I still have a couple of '99 village wines in the cellar, as well as a small stash of '99 Gevrey-Chambertin Combottes that I guard with my life. Maybe someday we'll have a chance to share one.

As for buying Burgs, that's something I have put into practice this year, with all but St. Innocent falling by the wayside in domestic Pinot.

Lovely ruby red color with an orange glint in the sunlight, spicy cherry aromas and a little caramel. The finish was a little short but all things considered, I'm not complaining..

Sounds exactly like a note I could have written for the 2000 Lignier Chambolle Baudes I had recently (except for the sunlight part as I was in the basement seating area of a restaurant).

Sorry to hear about the drama David mentions..