Chevalier Montrachet, Grand Cru, 2008

Rather full yellow with a gold tinge. Slightly exotic apricot and yellow peach scents on first sniff, with notes of wet stone, lemon zest, mandarin and baked bread quickly coming up. Fat, thick and honeyed on entry, but quickly firmed in the mid-palate by an edge of acidity, with strong iodiney minerality emerging on the back half. This tactile, chewy wine is still a bit disjointed, with its exotic creamy fruit and saline mineral notes still fighting each other, but its long, rocky, precise finish and vibrant acidity suggest that it will repay more time in bottle. Still, this wine shows more personality and nuance today than the 2009, which comes across as more classic and dry. Interestingly, both this wine and the '07 have occasionally been flagged by drinkers as showing premature oxidation notes but both of my bottles became fresher in the glass, which is certainly not a characteristic of wines in decline. Incidentally, this wine was bottled with 7.5 grams per liter of acidity (expressed as tartaric), the highest of any vintage in this vertical tasting. (13% alcohol; 3.1 pH; Brice de la Morandière described '08 as an oidium vintage saved by the north wind before the harvest, which started on September 22)

DRINKING WINDOW 2021 - 2037

date of review 09/2019