Description
Domaine Gérard Raphet, Bourgogne Rouge “Les Grands Champs”
It’s that time of year again: A $34 guaranteed winning ticket to Gérard Raphet’s “Les Grands Champs” sweepstakes…if you’re quick enough! Those who’ve snagged one of the past eight vintages we’ve offered know that the label vaguely hints at the excellence inside the bottle. Raphet exclusively sources his “Bourgogne Rouge” from a single parcel in the town of Gevrey-Chambertin, one that somehow falls outside of the AOC demarcation despite being surrounded by not one, not two, but three village-level vineyards.
In our eyes, it’s long been a purebred Gevrey Pinot which is why we’ve started putting quotes around “Bourgogne Rouge.” The amount of wine for the money here is simply stunning—the wise move would be to grab six or 12 bottles and take your house red to a new, mind-blowing level. Although our rabid following for this cuvée swells each year, our allocation exponentially dwindles, so I suggest moving with haste.
NOTE: The sweepstakes will continue this afternoon with a rarely seen Grand Cru offering…
Check out this map and you’ll discover that the lieu-dit of “Les Grands Champs” is surrounded on three sides by Gevrey-Chambertin AOC vineyards. In fact, if you were to stand in Grand Cru Chambertin-Clos de Bèze and look downhill, this parcel would be within viewing distance. How is it possible that this site fell outside the line? Often, vineyard sites are left out of appellation labeling for slight differences in elevation, slope, and/or soil composition. With Les Grand Champs, however, my palate distinguishes no difference—this wine is textbook Gevrey-Chambertin, loaded as it is with woodsy aromas and deep flavors.
Gérard Raphet, who took over the domaine from his father in 2002, works his parcels manually and farms today’s 40+-year-old vines with a lutte raisonnée approach, a method that implies the use of organic products unless under extreme circumstances for difficult vintages. Gérard and his team (which in recent years includes his daughter, Sylviane) use traditional cultivation methods and harvest only by hand. The grapes undergo strict sorting before fermentation with natural yeasts, and the Bourgogne Rouge is put into mostly neutral French oak barrels for 18 months. It is bottled unfined and unfiltered.
Raphet’s wines are characterized by exceptional concentration, sumptuous fruit, and velvety tannins. Popped and poured, this 2020 iteration delivers instantaneous pleasure, erupting with ripe blue and black plum, licorice, black raspberry, cherry liqueur, kola nut, forest floor, blood orange, cloves, and crushed limestone. It is medium-bodied and soft with a lingering iron-tinged minerality that hints at its Gevrey-Chambertin origins. Based on the vintage’s concentration and immediate pleasure, I don’t expect this to cellar as long as previous bottlings. Translation: It’s fully ready to be enjoyed now and over the next three years!
