Tasting note

From sandy loam and limestone soils, here is a Chardonnay that winemaker Sébastien Jacquey is looking to fashion with low PH and elevated tannin. A most commendable effort in the enigmatic '11 vintage, clean, anything but lean and un-gassed by a jet engine's aerified stream. Chardonnay running instead on the vineyard's biofuel, a chalky lees and lime texture that turns green in a savoury way towards the back end. Full, rich, gaining in stature as it breathes, thinks and feels. Atop the green there is an ambrosial aroma and a honeyed sense of flesh. A wine of great respect and biodynamic energy. Score - 92. (Michael Godel, winealign.com, Aug. 6, 2014)

Le Grand Clos Chardonnay is rich and seamless, with a noble character that cannot be described with simple fruit descriptors. Chalky nose; one senses a certain aristocratic reticence in this wine. Slowly opens up across the palate to reveal its pure stone-fruit, lanolin-textured complexity; with length, breadth and a finely-textured elegance, giving way to a complex, marzipan and limestone mineral-inflected ‘calcaire’ finish. Incredibly rich and long, yet somehow rich and restrained.