Domaine Julien Nuits-Saint-Georges Les Bousselots Premier Cru 2019
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Morris
Jasper -
Parker
Robert
Product Details
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Somm Note
Winemaker Notes
An attractive nose of baking spice with black cherry and cassis fruits, cedar and earth. The structure is firm and the medium-plus body flavors are very persistent resulting in a very long finish that is almost velvety in texture.
Professional Ratings
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Jasper Morris
100% new wood this year (though not always). Much deeper and more intense fruit. Etienne works closely with the Cavins on the barrel front. He likes the flesh and the freshness of new wood and it slips below the surface after a couple of years in bottle. Heady nose, with currently a slight oaky oxidative feel. Darker fruit, short of mulberry, fresher behind and with good intensity. Will emerge as a relatively classic Nuits-St-Georges I think.
Barrel Sample: 91-94 -
Robert Parker's Wine Advocate
The old-vine 2019 Nuits-Saint-Georges 1er Cru Les Bousselots is very promising, mingling aromas of cherries, cassis and sweet berry fruit with hints of cinnamon, dark chocolate and truffle. Medium to full-bodied, layered and concentrated, it's seamless and elegant, with succulent acids and a broad, expansive finish.
Recently, Gerard’s son Etienne Julien has assumed control of the estate. The fourth generation at the helm, Étienne is ushering in a new era of quality. Etienne set about upgrading things from the moment he took the reins beginning with the vineyards. A more organic approach was adopted and now the follow a strict "lutte raisonnee" methodology to control disease and pests. Yields are carefully controlled now and there is a sorting both in the vineyard as well as the winery before the grapes are destemmed. After a maceration of a few days with minimal punch downs, the wines are vinified and aged in 228L barrels until spring of the following year before being bottled. For the Cotes de Nuits-Villages and Nuits St Georges, the wines typically are aged in 30% new barrels, whereas the Nuits St Georges 1er Cru and the Echezeaux will see 50% new barrels.
Etienne has just taken over at the domaine, but in a very short time it’s clear he is a real talent who is continuing to improve. In the coming years he no doubt will be one of the fresh faces in Burgundy that everyone will be talking about.
Thin-skinned, finicky and temperamental, Pinot Noir is also one of the most rewarding grapes to grow and remains a labor of love for some of the greatest vignerons in Burgundy. Fairly adaptable but highly reflective of the environment in which it is grown, Pinot Noir prefers a cool climate and requires low yields to achieve high quality. Outside of France, outstanding examples come from in Oregon, California and throughout specific locations in wine-producing world. Somm Secret—André Tchelistcheff, California’s most influential post-Prohibition winemaker decidedly stayed away from the grape, claiming “God made Cabernet. The Devil made Pinot Noir.”
Inhabiting the bottom end of the northern half of the Côte d’Or, Nuits-St-Georges is a busy, market-driven town and home to many of Burgundy’s negociants. It is also the largest town in the Côte d’Or after Beaune and contributes "nuits" to the name of Côte de Nuits (i.e., the northern half of the Côte d’Or).
The appellation itself is divided into two parts, where in the north it directly borders Vosne-Romanée, the southerly end is the commune of Prémeaux. There are no Grands Crus in this village, though it does have a large number of Premiers Crus.
The best Nuits-St-Georges Pinot Noir are layered with cherry, plum, underbrush and sandalwood. The fruit is sweet, the wine energetic, and the finish long and lush.