Winehog - with a passion

Burgundy Insights from the Winehog

Free Tour – A Vineyard Insight – (Mostly paid content)

to Next page of the Free Tour->

Terroir Insight: Comte Liger-Belair NSG Clos des Grandes Vignes

One of my favorite parts of Burgundy is Premeaux – and since I seem to be the only one to think that Premeaux should have its own appellation – l think its fair to assume that it will continue to be a part of Nuits-Saint-Georges for now.

I have covered many of the Premeaux monopoles, but somehow I never got around to Clos des Grandes Vignes – the monopole within Les Grandes Vignes and the only 1er cru below RN974.

In a sense the focus on the location below the road is a bit out of proportions .. as the truth is always to be found in the glass. To be honest I think Louis-Michel Liger-Belair has proved in recent vintages that magnificent wines can be made even below the RN974 – at least from this monopole in the northern part of Premeaux

But lets leave the village of Nuits-Saint-Georges and go south to Premeaux and turn left just before we enter the village ..

Premeaux-Prissy – the missing appellation

The Premeaux appellation was lost in the classification .. and the vineyards are now a part of the large and diverse Nuits-Saint-Georges appellation.

To the north we have one or perhaps even two sections, that are more closely related to Vosne-Romanée. South of the Nuits-Saint-Georges town we have the “classic Nuit-Saint-Georges” with vineyards like Les Saint-Georges, and after this section we have the last and southern part of Nuits-Saint-Georges – the Premeaux area – or if you like the Premeaux-Prissey appellation.


–

  1. Clos des Grandes Vignes
  2. Les Forêts
  3. Aux Perdrix
  4. Aux Corvées
  5. Aux Corvées Pagets
  6. Clos St. Marc
  7. Les Argilliéres
  8. Clos Arlot
  9. Clos de la Maréchale

The Premeaux appellation – most of it shown on the map above – is in my view a very interesting area with several monopoles and a area that has experienced a tremendous improvement in quality the last 10 to 15 years. Just take Clos des Corvées from Domaine Prieure-Roch, Clos de la Maréchales from Domaine J.-F. Mugnier and finally Clos des Grandes Vignes made by Domaine du Comte Liger-Belair since 2012 – the topic of this article.

As it can be seen Les Grandes Vignes and with that Clos des Grandes Vignes is located below Clos des Corvées Pagets and partly Clos Saint-Marc. But lets go to the details …

————–

The rest of the article is for the Premium Subscribers

Nuits-Saint-Georges Les Grandes Vignes village and 1er cru

Les Grandes Vignes is 3.9075 ha in total and is located in the lower northern end of the Premeaux appellation below RN974.

The map below show Les Grandes Vignes in total with the Clos des Grandes Vignes marked by a red line and the area classifed as village marked with a white line.

The village part have at least two owners – one being Domaine Sylvain Loichet – an organic producer from Comblanchien, and another is Domaine Daniel Rion et Fils in Premeaux.

Nuits-Saint-Goerges Clos des Grandes Vignes a part of Les Grandes Vignes

So Clos des Grandes Vignes is a separate Clos classified as a 1er cru within Les Grandes Vignes.

The 1er cru Clos des Grandes Vignes is 2.1953 ha and located in the southern part of Les Grandes Vignes below the Patrice Rion estate, Clos Saint-Marc and Aux Corvées Pagets.

Clos des Grandes Vignes – a red and a white 1er cru

Two wines are currently being made by Domaine du Comte Liger-Belair on Clos des Grandes Vignes – a red and a white 1er cru.

The red Clos des Grandes Vignes is made from a 1.12 ha plot of old vines (1) on the map below, these vines are planted in the mid 1950s i.e. around 60 years old.

The white Clos des Grandes Vignes is made from a 0.32 ha plot in the lower part of the vineyard – the wines here are also quite old (presumably planted at the same time as the upper part), but regrafted under the Ètienne de Montille ownership. The white vines are located in the area (2) on the map below.

The areas (3) 0.40 ha and (4) 0.25 ha were replanted in 2013, so have very young Pinot Noir vines. These are currently not in production due to the age of the vines.

Lastly the area (5) 0.0753 ha in the southern corner was planted with Pinot Noir in 2015 – this is an experiment with high density planting in this case around 24.000 vines per ha – approximately the double of the standard density of vines.

But lets take a look at the history of Clos des Grandes Vignes …

Clos des Grandes Vignes – “Always” a monopole?

Firstly “always” is a strong word in Burgundian history .. but lets move back to some of the earliest known sources .. and that is in fact the first Cadastre – in the case of Premeaux-Prissey its from 1827.

The cadastre map from 1827 show that the main plot of Les Grandes Vignes – the Clos des Grandes Vignes – looks just like the plot we see today in the current cadastre – i.e. the borders has remained unchanged since the first cadastre. One plot indicate one owner of the area today known as Clos des Grandes Vignes – i.e. a monopole.

In Lavalle 18551 the ownership of Les Grandes Vignes was descriped in quite great detail – as it was mentioned that Viénot Aîné owned 2 ha of the total 3.9075 ha.

This more or less prove that the 2 ha Clos des Grande Vignes was in fact owned by one owner Viénot Aîné in 1855.

So it is very likely that Clos des Grandes Vignes has remained a monopole at least back to 1827 … being owned by Viénot Aîné in 1855, and perhaps even further back.

The ownership history of Clos des Grandes Vignes

The ownership history of Clos des Grandes Vignes is quite well described by the usual sources … starting with Lavalle 18551 – see above.

Moving to Danguy & Aubertin2 we see the following owners mentioned

There was no Viénot Aîné but a Prosper Viénot and it is likely that the Clos des Grandes Vignes has remained under some kind of Vienot ownership until at least 1892 when Danguy & Aubertin wrote their book.

Next fix-point – Rodier3 1920 – here three owners were mentioned:

  1. Chopin-Guibert
  2. Cognieux
  3. Michelot

Interestingly Rodier3 did not mention the Viénot family among the owners in 1920, but according Jean-Francois Bazin4 the Viénot maintained the ownership during the 1930’s until 1982 when Michel Viénot sold the vineyard to Thomas family – who made wines under several estate names namely Thomas Moillard and Moillard Grivot (negociant label).

I have however seen Clos des Grandes Vignes from Moillard-Grivot even from vintages well before 1982 – so presumably Thomas-Moillard got some grapes or wine from Viénot even before they acquired Clos des Grandes Vignes in 1982.

The Thomas-Moillard ownership lasted until 2005/2006 when a large part of the estates vineyards were sold to a group of investors and estates – mainly Domaine de Montille (including Chateau de Puligny-Montrachet) and Domaine Dujac.

The Clos des Grandes Vignes was placed in Chateau de Puligny-Montrachet at that time managed by Étienne de Montille but owned by Credit Foncier.

Étienne converted to organic viticulture when he took over, and began to employ biodynamic viticulture. Étienne also regrafted 0.32 ha of Clos des Grandes Vignes with Chardonnay creating a white Clos des Grandes Vignes.

In 2012 Clos des Grandes Vignes was sold to Domaine du Comte Liger-Belar the current owner – in after a deal where de Montille acquired Chateau de Puligny Montrachet.

The Organic/Biodynamic viticulture was continued by Louis-Michel Liger-Belair, but the plots with young vines were replanted in 2013 – in the sectors 3, 4 and 5 on the map above.

Since 2012 a red has been produced from the old vines, and a white from the regrafted vines – see the specific plots on the map above.

Nuits-Saint-Georges Clos des Grandes Vignes – the wine

I have tasted the reds made by Étienne de Montille from Clos des Grandes Vignes and while he also only used grapes from the old wines located in the top part of the vineyard – it was to be honest not wines destined for greatness. They are pretty wines, well made, but not quite up to the standard normally produced by Domaine de Montille – but important to note it was also sold under the Chateau de Puligny-Montrachet brand, and presumably not made with the same ambitions as the wines made by Domaine de Montille – and accordingly priced lower.

I was however intrigued by the delicate slightly perfumed style of the Clos des Grandes Vignes from Chateau de Puligny-Montrachet and the expression of terroir was clearly more Premeaux than the more sturdy terroirs located in the central part of Nuits-Saint-Georges north of Premeaux. The wines from Premeaux often have a very enjoyable drinkablility … and this is also the case with Clos des Grandes Vignes.

It’s a wine with a quite filigree minerality – hence finely structured and subtle – offering a harmonious mouthfeel and a quite silky texture. The energy is fine – but more “controlled” and less expressive than the one expressed in Aux Cras. This is more or less often the case with many wines from Premeaux – perhaps aside from Les Argillieres located on the steep slope above Clos St. Marc.

In some sense Clos des Grandes Vignes resembles Clos des Corvées Pagets a bit, as it has the same fine energy and detailed and slightly perfumed nose. This is perhaps understandable as the top soil despite the location is quite shallow – only 40 – 60 cm – clay with 20% rocks. The sub-soil is limestone with debris of marine organisms – the limestone is either Ladoix Limestone or Dijon-Corton Limestone4

The first vintage from Louis-Michel Liger-Belair (2012) was fine – but did not blow my socks off .. but already in 2013 he had found additional layers and depth – still retaining this delicate perfumed floral note in the bouquet. In 2014 it was another step up in quality … and in the 2015 vintage it took another step up – and have now established itself quite well in the line-up from Liger-Belair.

It has it’s own style – it’s not quite matching the Vosne-Romanée Les Petits-Monts, Aux Brûlées or the aux Reignots but it is in 2014/2015 on quite equal terms with Aux Cras and even Les Suchots. This is quite an achievement and this really show the potential of the best terroirs of Premeaux.

I will not repeat my claim that Premeaux should have it’s own appellation as no one seem to support this – I do however feel that the wines from this part of Nuits-Saint-Georges deserve a lot more acclaim.

Tasting notes – Clos des Grandes Vignes

Domaine du Comte Liger-Belair, Nuits-St-Georges Clos des Grandes Vignes 2015

When Louis-Michel Liger-Belair began his journey with Nuits Saint Georges Clos des Grandes Vignes I must say that I was a bit doubtful whether this wine could take a high position in the impressive range of wines the estate offers. I have been amazed and surprised by the progress and the rapid improvement in quality .. and the 2015 is a further step up in quality from the truly delightful 2014.

The 2015 Clos des Grandes Vignes is the best wine from this terroir so far. The yield in 2015 was only 17hl per ha .. and this definitely contributes to the quality and intensity of the wine. From other tastings it seems that Premeaux has done better in 2015 than the main southern part of NSG – retaining more freshness. So seem to be the case here; The bouquet offer generous and juicy red and dark berry fruit very expressive with some spicy oak notes interlinked with the earthy Premeaux minerality. On the palate rich, intense and with a lovely silky texture – lovely tension and energy. Its very harmonious with the slightly edgy NSG minerality swept in layers of ripe and pure fruit. Chapeau!

20120309-125513.jpg(Drink from 2028) – Very Fine – (93 – 94p) – Tasted 09/12/2016 – from CASK

References & Sources:

  1. Jules Lavalle, Histoire et Statistique de la Vignes et Des Grands Vins de la Côte d’Or (1855)
  2. M.R. Danguy et M. Ch. Aubertin, Les Grands Vins de Bourgogne (1892)
  3. Camille Rodier, Le Vin de Bourgogne (1920)
  4. Jean-Francois Bazin, Les Comtes Liger-Belair Deux sieècles Au Service de La Romanee (2015)

Thanks to Louis-Michel Liger-Belair for detailed information about the vineyard management and the recent plantings of the vineyard.

to Next page of the Free Tour->