2012 Domaine Jean Grivot, Echezeaux Grand Cru

The 2012 Echézeaux is drop-dead gorgeous. Layers of dark red and black fruit flow across the palate, followed by sweet scents of tobacco, licorice, menthol and spices, all underpinned by subtle veins of minerality that give the wine its sense of energy. A beautifully layered, resonant wine, the 2012 should offer a long window of pure drinking pleasure. The interplay of fruit and structure is utterly captivating.

Bright dark red. Aromas of musky raspberry, rose petal and coffee. Sappy, precise and deep, showing outstanding cut and lift to its flavors of crushed red raspberry and dried flowers. Like the Clos Vougeot this conveys an impression of great vivacity, but this one is in a more feminine, weightless style. The whiplash of a finish, which features noble tannins, leaves the palate vibrating with flavors of red licorice, wild herbs, mint and smoky minerality. "The tiny crop levels of the last few years have made a huge difference," noted Etienne Grivot at this point in our tasting.

The 2012 Echezeaux Grand Cru is open and garrulous on the nose brimming over with ripe red cherries, wild strawberry and bergamot scents that are beautifully defined. The palate is very structured but you do not notice that thanks to the candied fruit on the entry that zips about the mouth, electrifying the senses and leaving it with a daring citrus kiss on the vivacious finish. Oh la la. First stop - week 5 - Domaine Jean Grivot in Vosne-Romanee. After several dispiriting and unremittingly tenebrous days when the sun appeared to have excommunicated from Burgundy for simply being too bright, today there is not a puff of white in the sky and so the drive to Vosne-Romanee is a joy. La famille Grivot were all at the winery, including Etienne’s wife Marielle who I had met chez Simon Bize three weeks earlier (her brother Patrick having passed away recently). For me, this address acts as a barometer for how well the appellation performed since the domaine is virtually a roll call of the villages most esteemed premier crus, not to mention one or two choice grand crus. After the trials and tribulations of a fraught growing season recounted elsewhere, Etienne dusted off the secateurs on 20 September and the harvest continued for 8 days thereafter. He told me that due to the cold spring the malo-lactics fermentation had commenced later than usual and had sulfured his barrels three times during elevage. Despite everything, the barrel samples that were assembled as close to the final blend as possible, were exemplary from start to finish, despite having to swerve around reduction here and there. The “Accad” days have long been forgotten and having tracked most of their wines over the last 15 years, I have discerned a tangible “fine-tuning” in the last five or six years. If you are ever lucky enough to be able to compare and contrast his Vosne premier crus then it is immediately evident that Etienne expresses the typicite of each with greater clarity than say a decade ago. It cannot be denied that this amelioration has gone hand in hand with increased prices and the days when even impoverished old me could forage for affordable village crus and premier crus are gone. On the other hand, Etienne is creating wines that I think he has always dreamed of making and 2012 delivered the goods. Importer: Diageo Chateau & Estate Wines, Napa CA; tel. (707) 299-2600 and through several merchants in the UK.