Description
Domaine Frédéric Esmonin, Ruchottes-Chambertin Grand Cru
Welcome to the first offer of 2022! We’re starting off the year strong with an end-of-vintage 2014 Grand Cru from one of Gevrey’s most quintessential names: Frédéric Esmonin. By now, you’re surely familiar with the name, but what of the vineyard in question, Ruchottes-Chambertin?
You’re excused if you don’t have any bottles of this laying around in your cellar: This reigns as one of Burgundy’s smallest Grand Crus, and the handful of producers that do craft Pinot Noir here all belong in the “luxury goods” category—Domaines Roumier, Rousseau, and Mugneret-Gibourg all fetch over $1,000, and Pacalet’s is about half of that. As for Esmonin? Just $140, and that’s not for some juicy new release but the final tranche of his 2014, one of my favorite “classic” vintages. So, if you wish to lose yourself in a deep, savory, truly soulful Grand Cru and be reminded why Gevrey-Chambertin is one of the top Pinot Noir-producing villages on earth, Esmonin’s stunningly perfumed Ruchottes is it! You’ll have to act quickly because we have just seven cases to share. Note: If you were quick enough to secure a bottle of their 2014 Mazy-Chambertin last year, please open them simultaneously so I can live vicariously through you!
Located in Gevrey-Chambertin and focused almost entirely on wines from that village, the Esmonin family has only been “domaine bottling” its own wines since the late 1980s; prior to that, André Esmonin sold grapes (and wine) to some of Burgundy’s most respected négociants, including Jadot and Leroy. André continues to assist his son, Frédéric, at this tiny property, whose vineyard holdings include pieces of the Grand Crus Ruchottes- and Mazy-Chambertin as well as three Premier Cru sites. Their vines are very old (50+ years in the Grand Crus) and production is, as you might expect, very small: Overall, they bottle around a dozen different wines, none of them in significant quantities.
The Esmonins farm sustainably, practicing a French approach known as lutte raisonnée, which essentially translates to intervention only when necessary. Their half-hectare of 60-year-old vines in Grand Cru Ruchottes du Bas (the lower part of the vineyard) cozies right up to the walled parcel farmed by legend Armand Rousseau, whose own 2014 bottling sells for a cool $1,000. Still, regardless of who’s selling it, a wine from Ruchottes-Chambertin will not be cheap, because it is by definition extremely rare: the entire vineyard spans just over three hectares, and is divvied up amongst an all-star cast of Gevrey heavyweights. That’s why “value” is an apt descriptor for Esmonin’s $140 back-vintage bottling!
After a hand harvest, their Ruchottes-Chambertin grapes undergo a brief cold maceration before fermentation. The resulting wine matures in high-quality mostly new French barrels for approximately 16 months before an unfiltered bottling. This 2014 from Esmonin is textbook Grand Cru red Burgundy—a truly regal red wine, succulent and deeply perfumed in a way that few other reds of the world can match. In the glass, it reveals a deep ruby moving to hints of bricking at the rim with notes of dried red and black cherry, blackberry, black tea, forest floor, baking spice, and sous bois alongside blossoming secondaries. Structured and medium-plus-bodied on the palate, its tannins lend a firm backbone that deepens the woodsy flavors and crushed mineral core. You could certainly enjoy a bottle tonight—decant it about 45 minutes before serving in large Burgundy stems at 60 degrees—but I think this wine’s best self will be revealed a few more years down the line, say on its 10th birthday. Cheers!
