Wine & Spirits - Fall 2022 - 57

Top 100 Wineries
FRANCE | BURGUNDY
Lucien Le Moine
Mounir and Rotem Saouma are micro-négociants working at the sitesensitive
level of a great Burgundy domaine.
MOUNIR SaOUMa
A winemAking monk nAmed mounir trAnslated
his name into French, establishing
Lucien Le Moine with his wife, Rotem, a
Dijon-trained agronomist. In 1999, they set
out to behave like vignerons, without the
restriction of having to make wine from
their own parcels. They tapped their friends,
whose farming they respected, and asked to
taste the juice out of the press to determine
whether to buy it. They settled in a cool,
humid cellar in Beaune, where they make
one to three barrels of wine per cru, working
by hand without any assists from pumps,
and bottling by gravity after the full moon
begins to wane. Two decades on, micronégociants
are a thing, but there is nothing
like Lucien Le Moine and its ever evolving
collection of site-expressive crus. They have
adapted strategies from the 19th century,
when fruit didn't ripen until October and
the cold climate delayed fermentations as
winter set in. They fill their barrels with wine
and lees, then leave them, closing the cellar
to sustain humidity and cool temperatures
into the spring, which extends the malolactic
conversion into the summer and generates
carbon dioxide in the barrels. That CO2
protects the wine from oxygen, minimizing
the need for sulfur, but requiring a decant to
encourage the wine to reveal itself. -J.G.
2019 Bonnes-Mares Grand Cru ($650, 95
points) " Bonnes-Mares is my favorite terroir
on earth, " Mounir says, " as it combines all the
Côte d'Or in one glass. It's the only one exposed
northeast and southeast, and having white and
red soil. " The wine draws you in and then keeps
giving, its black cherry depths pulsed by chalk,
rose and peach impressions that amplify its
power. Dense, silken and welcoming.
FOUNDED:
1999
WINEMAKERS/OWNERS:
Rotem & Mounir
Saouma
ANNUAL PRODUCTION:
3,500 cases
IMPORTER:
Vintus, NY
2019 Clos St-Denis Grand Cru ($435, 95
points) A grand cru gone wild in its floral spice,
this directs the ripeness of 2019 toward bold
intensity. There's an animal side to the fruit and
a fruity wild mushroom side, a complex matrix
of cherry leaf, leather and floral strawberry over
dark tannins-a compelling wine to age.
2019 Gevrey-Chambertin 1er Cru Les Cazetiers
($245, 94 points) These centenarian
vines provide concentration in the best sense:
Their fruit tastes like Gevrey, even as the wine
feels airy and light. Opening to a floral explosion
of energy, this holds to delicate, black blueberryskin
tannins and tight red-fruited grace.
FOUNDED:
1829
CHEFS DE CAVE:
Gilles Descôtes, Denis
Bunner (deputy)
VITICULTURIST:
Gaël Vuille
OWNER:
Société Jacques
Bollinger
ACRES OWNED:
439
ESTATE GROWN:
60%
IMPORTER:
Vintus, NY
FRANCE | CHAMPAGNE
Bollinger
Bollinger's Coteaux Champenois gains its resonance from the chalk cliffs
of Aÿ, while new Champagnes focus on grand cru pinot noir.
GIllES DESCOTES
As A medium for pinot noir, Bollinger's
monopole at the Côte aux Enfants is noteworthy
not only for the steepness of its
slope, but for the active limestone in the
soil. Nearly ten acres, the vineyard rises to
the top of the hill in Aÿ, its west face providing
pinot noir for the firm's rosé Champagnes.
On its southeast face, technical
director Gilles Descôtes farms two acres for
Bollinger's Coteaux Champenois. In recent
years, Descôtes and his team have been
adding perspectives on pinot noir from
this corner of Champagne's Marne Valley
and east into the Montagne de Reims.
They launched PN Brut with the 2015 vintage
based on pinot noir from Verzanay-
VZ15, followed by VZ16. This year, they
introduced B13, a new blend of pinot noir
focused on grand cru villages, a 2013 that
plays to the strengths of their farming in a
challenging season. Bollinger's devotion to
its stock of reserve wines-fermented in barrels
coopered on site then aged in magnum
bottles-once gave the brand a rich, oxidative
style appropriate to an old British men's
club. In the sunnier days of the 21st century,
under the viticulture-first leadership of
Descôtes, the style has evolved to be fresher,
more precise and more closely tied to the
land. -J.G.
2016 Coteaux Champenois La Côte aux
Enfants ($180, 95 points) For this pinot noir,
Descôtes started to experiment with whole clusters
in the fermentation in 2015, hoping to integrate
the stem tannins into the buzzy acidity the
grapes develop from the active limestone in the
soil. In 2016, that integration builds into luscious
elegance, a grand cru from Champagne with its
own distinctly chic beauty.
Champagne PN VZ16 Brut ($130, 94 points)
Based on fruit from Verzenay in the 2016 harvest,
this is all pinot noir, including the reserve
wines. It's as muscular as Bollinger's classic vintage
wines but with a rich berry-fruit component
to fill it with ripeness. Freshness shows in the
ghost of red-wine tannins, a flavor of red apple
skins that lasts with focus and precision.
2013 Champagne B13 Brut ($160, 93 points)
With its raw limestone power, this pinot noir puts
the savor of the earth on display. There's berry
fruit at the center of the wine, surrounded by jasmine
notes and brisk, pithy acidity. The clean finish
makes it lovely to drink now, while the structure
bodes well for aging.
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