2005 Domaine du Château de Chorey Beaune 1er Cru Les Cras Vieilles Vignes

From sixty-some year-old vines in chalk and flint-rich soil, Germain’s 2005 Beaune Les Cras Vieilles Vignes more than lives up to the reputation established in the course of many vintages by its illustrious predecessors. A complex nose of black cherry, orange zest, black truffle, toasted walnuts and subtle flowers lead to a palate of fresh, spiced cherry, sedate underlying fresh meatiness and a fascinating finishing interplay of fruit, spice, piquant nuttiness, sweet florality, wet stone, salt, and indeed downright ineffable minerality. This incorporates 50% new oak, but it’s not noticeable. Also recommended: 2005 Chorey-les-Beaune ($25.00; 86). Benoit Germain has been at pains to retain the distinctive personalities and terroir transparency as well as ageability that wines of Chateau de Chorey routinely displayed under his father Francois’s regimen, while at the same time, through varied and sensitive fermentative techniques promoting more flattering primary fruit, refining tannic structure, and thus rendering wines more approachable in their youth. Germain is also beginning to incorporate elements of biodynamics. Malos took place promptly in Spring, but he seemed in no hurry when I visited to begin the bottling of his Beaune crus, which will take place without filtration. A Becky Wassserman Selection (various importers), Le Serbet, Beaune; fax 011-33-3-80-24-29-70. Also imported by Simon N Cellars, Charlottesville, VA; tel. (434) 977 4476 and a Scott Levy Selection, Norcross, GA; tel. (770) 730 0361