Thursday, December 21, 2017

Domaine Henri GOUGES (Nuits-Saint-Georges): 2016 Tasted from Barrel and a 2015 and 2014 Tasted from Bottle

Gregory Gouges reported that production overall in 2016 was 16 hl/ha, roughly half of what the estate aims for each year. The vineyards south of Nuits suffered the most. The two flagship vineyards, Vaucrains and Les Saint-Georges, yielded but 10 and 11 hl/ha, respectively. The wine from two vineyards, Chaignots (50% of a normal crop) and Chênes Carteaux (10% of a normal crop) was declassified into the village Nuits in order to keep the village wine quantity sufficient (it is necessary to insure a sufficient quantity of village wine for commercial reasons, such as supply to restaurants).

There was a little mildew, but the estate continued to work without chemical treatments, and in the end, only about 2-3% was lost to mildew.

Harvest took place between 3 and 7 October, finishing before the rain. There was almost no triage — the harvesters were instructed not to take bunches that were not good, and in the end, only about 2-3% was eliminated. The estate uses chaptalization only in years where there is insufficient maturity or there is some dilution due to large yield, neither of which was the case in 2016. Pigeage and remontage (punching down and pumping over) were like normal, but fermentation temperatures were a little lower than usual because of the lower masses. As usual here, whole clusters were not used.

Malolactic fermentations began in December; the reds finished in June, but the whites were later — finishing just a little before my visit at the end of October.



Bottling will probably begin in early 2018. (Continue reading here.)

posted by Claude Kolm has been writing The Fine Wine Review since 1986. At the end of 2014, it switched to a blog in order to allow more timely and in depth information about estates. @ 5:19 PM