Vosne-Romanée is the brightest star of Burgundy wine region

October 1, 2010

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Vosne-Romanée and Flagey-Echézeaux

There can be little doubt that, in the firmament of the Côte de Nuits. Vosne-Romanée is the brightest star.Turning off the RN74 into the village never fails to evoke a feeling of pilgrimage, a sense that this unpretentious little village and its backdrop of magnificent vineyards are something special and that those who own this precious land must be among the most fortunate souls on earth.

The pilgrim needs no other reason to visit Vosne than to wander through its streets up to the slopes behind, perhaps to taste at a grower’s cellar or just to picnic among the vines on a warm afternoon, inwardly marvelling that from this ordinary-looking land come some of the world’s legendary, most sumptuous and extraordinary wines.

By comparison to the Côte’s other communes, Vosne is not large – just 182 ha of vines, but vines of a quality that brings one to one’s knees. To the east and southeast of the Post Office lies the lion’s share of the Village appellation – 98.57 ha, mainly of thin but well-drained clay-limestone soils, topped with a pebbles and limestone scree. These produce wines which balance depth and richness with elegance and breed; often described as silky, they are usually marked by finesse and perfume which, together with their natural power, age beautifully.

Scattered round to both sides and to the west, are Vosne’s 16 Premiers Crus. These occupy some 57.19 ha, often on slopes of up to 15%, and are mainly exposed to either the east or south-east. These soils tend to have less depth and to contain a higher proportion of limestone than those in Village vineyards and the topsoil is mainly scree, making for excellent drainage. Although there is no marked quality distinction between them, Les Suchots (13.07 ha), Les Beaux Monts (11.39 ha), aux Malconsorts (5.86 ha) and Les Chaumes (6.46 ha) are the largest and therefore somewhat better known.

The associated commune of Flagey-Echézeaux – whose vineyards are generally considered as part of Vosne – is something of a curiosity. This perfunctory hamlet of some 450 souls lies not along the main flank of the Côte, but on the eastern side of the RN74 beyond the railway tracks. Tradition has it that the name ‘Flagey’ derives from the flagellative scything action used by the peasants to harvest corn in the 6th century. ‘Echézeaux’ was tacked on in 1886. With no appellation of their own for Village and Premiers Crus, the handful of vineyards falling into these categories are accorded the relevant Vosne-Romanée appellation. Were it not for its two Grands Crus – Echézeaux and Grands Echézeaux – Flagey would barely warrant notice. However, the village now has an excellent small restaurant, owned and run by Robert Losset, an ex-chef from the liner France, which for some mysterious reason only opens at lunchtime and closes altogether on Wednesdays.

Vosne’s Grands Crus are capable of producing quintessential Burgundy – wines of such opulence, depth and refinement that it is difficult to believe that they are solely the product of bunches of grapes.

Of these, Les Echézeaux is both the largest and the most variable in quality. Many believe that most of its 11 constituent climats deserve no more than Premier Cru status and should not have been included when the 1963 Grand Cru delimitation, which only extended to the 3.57 ha of Les Echézeaux Dessus, was subsequently revised.

The Echézeaux vines extend to the dizzy height of 360 m above sea level on slopes of up to 15%. The soils vary within the vineyard, but are relatively deep even in the top sections, being composed chiefly of fine silt-stone, clay and pebbles, over the hard limestone base; on which most of Vosne-Romanée rests. It is this depth and richness which gives the potential for quality.

Indisputably Grand Cru, however, is Les Grands Echézeaux, a 9.14 ha slab of moderately flat land bordering the western edge of the Clos de Vougeot, with soils of similar content and structure to Les Eschézeaux. Of the 8 Vosne Grands Crus these (and possibly Lamarche’s Grande Rue) are the only ones which come anywhere near to a sensible quality:price ratio. In good vintages, Grands Echézeaux from Domaines such as Clos Frantin, Drouhin, Jean Mongeard, Engel and the Romanée-Conti are excellent.

At 0.85 ha, La Romanée, on a 16% slope, sandwiched between La Romanée-Conti to the east and Premier Cru Aux Raignots to the west, with Les Richebourgs to the north and la Grande Rue to the south, is the smallest Grand Cru in the Côte d’Or. Originally joined to the Romanée-Conti vineyard, it was split in 1750 when the Prince de Conti bought the lower section. Owned since 1815 by the Liger-Belair family, its 300 case output is sold by the négociants Bouchard Pere et Fils. The wine comes no where near equalling- that of its illustrious neighbour.

In contrast, Romanée-St.-Vivant is situated on virtually flat ground to the north and west of the village. The soil is unusually deep, dominated by limestone with a high clay con-tent. More than half of its 9.43.74 ha are owned by the Domaine de la Romanée-Conti who acquired them from the Marey-Monge family in 1988. Its wine can be excellent, but is often overshadowed by the other Grands Crus. Domaine de l’Arlot and Alain Hudelot also make fine examples.

Les Richebourgs, which Camille Rodier described as ‘one of the most sumptuous Crus of Burgundy’, is an amalgam of 5.05 ha of genuine Richebourg and 2.98ha of Vosne Premier Cru Les Verroilles which was tacked on later. Oriented eastwards, the vineyard is mainly on limestone with some clay, giving its wines characteristic meaty robustness and firm charpente; whence its longevity. The finest examples come from Romanée-Conti, Meo-Camuset, Henri Jayer, Alain Hudelot-Noellat, Jean Gros and Jean Grivot, in no particular order.

The 1.65 ha strip of La Grande Rue was, until 1991, one of those anomalies of classification one sometimes encounters in the Côte d’Or – a Premier Crus sandwiched between two Grands Crus – in this case La Tache and Romanée-Conti. It has belonged to the Domains Lamarche (qv) ever since Henri Lamarche was given it as a wedding present in 1933. The present generation, Francois and Marie-Blanche Lamarche, finally succeeded after a long and persistent campaign, in persuading the authorities to reclassify it as Grand Cru, chiefly on that ground that it shares the same soil band as its neighbours. Twenty ares are in fact in Les Gaudichots.

The remaining pair of Grands Crus, La Tache and Romanée-Conti – both Monopoles of the Domaine de la Romanée-Conti – represent the summit of what Burgundy and the Pinot Noir grape are capable. The one lies to the southwest of the Post office, covering a broad strip reaching almost to the summit of the Côte, whilst the other sits majestically, compact, in the heart of the Grands Crus, marked by a simple stone cross.

Wine from those precious plots exudes breed and elegance. At once silky, opulent and fine, with mature aromas of spice and violets they offer multi-faceted flavours of glorious richness and length. Words – even if suitable ones could be found, which is doubtful – are woefully inadequate when faced with such superlative examples of the winemaker’s art and attempts at description easily degenerate into senseless pretension. These are the wines of which vignerons throughout the Côte and well beyond, whether they admit it or not, stand in awe, hoarding a few treasured bottles in their own cellars to crown some special occasion. These are the apotheosis of Vosne-Romanée, and Vosne-Romanée is the apotheosis of Burgundy.

Source: http://www.greatdomaines.co.za/vosne_text.html

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