Meursault 1er cru 2017 Les Perrières - Domaine de Montille

Meursault 1er cru 2017 Les Perrières - Domaine de Montille

 

The 2017 Vintage:

The 2017 vintage at Domaine de Montille started with a very harsh spring. The vineyards on the slopes withstood the frosts, unlike 2016 when they affected the vineyard in an atypical, uneven way, and mainly the white grapes on the hillside. Spring 2017 concentrated the cold in the lower plots, in their burgundy plots. These losses are generally considered acceptable compared to the dramatic losses of 2016.

In white, it is a great vintage, crystalline, with a beautiful aromatic complexity mixing hawthorn, white flowers and citrus fruits. A fairly early harvest, which began on August 29th, enabled us to preserve the freshness and tension of the vintage. The texture is fluid, the mouths are ample, deep and salty. It is closer to the 2014, 2007 than the last vintages but will, in my opinion, be ready earlier (3 to 7 years) even if these wines will be able to blossom with time.

 

The Meursault 1er Cru Les Perrières 2017 is one of the highlights of the range, unfolding in glass with notions of waxy lemon zest, dried white flower, marzipan and wet stones. On the palate, the wine is medium to full-bodied, acidic and incisive, with attractive purity and structural tension, ending with a long mineral finish.

The Appellation :

Among the Premiers Crus of Meursault, some are considered to be Grand Premiers Crus, the Charmes, the Genevrières and of course the Perrières, the more sought-after climate, are often cited as the natural candidate for possible promotion to Grand Cru.

The term Perrière evokes stone and quarries. This terroir contains a lot of limestone pebbles which give the wine a remarkable minerality, superior to all the other Premiers Crus of Meursault and which, on this point, brings it closer to the great wines of Puligny which it is close to.

Our plot of Meursault Perrières of 0.45 ha is situated in the upper part of the cru and gives a dense, vertical wine.  The nose is above all mineral, stony but offers a lot of complexity with often floral notes (white flowers, hawthorn). The palate is concentrated, structured, almost firm. The tension and the persistence, which are precisely due to the mineral character, are impressive. It often takes 5 to 7 years for this cru to express all its qualities.

This parcel is exploited by the Domaine de Montille since the 2012 vintage, it was previously exploited by the Château de Puligny-Montrachet.

The wines, the style :

Our wines are renowned for their great aromatic purity, we always favour balance and elegance rather than power and extraction. The wines are a classic expression of Burgundy, their appellation in general and their terroir in particular. The cultivation methods used contribute to this sought-after personalisation and the vinification process must avoid all excesses and instead seek the point of balance where the Burgundy terroir will find its rightful place.

The harvest is entirely manual and thanks to the use of pneumatic presses, we can modulate our presses according to the quality of the grapes and the profile of the vintage. After a light settling, the musts are put into barrels, mainly of 600 litres and also of 228 litres, where the alcoholic and malolactic fermentation takes place.

We use about 5 to 20% new barrels with wood coming essentially from the Allier, with a long and light toasting. The first racking takes place after about a year of maturing in wood to begin the second phase (4 to 6 months) in stainless steel vats in order to keep the wine fresh and taut. We conclude this ageing process with a light fining followed by an equally respectful filtration of the wine before bottling.

Cultivation of the vine: The Domaine has been practicing organic farming since 1995. Our wines are now Ecocert certified. Since 2005, biodynamic farming has been added to these practices, which respect the soil and living organisms.