Lucien Le Moine Bonnes Mares

Burgundy Commune Comparison Double Blind Tasting (Atlanta, GA) : Tasted double blind. Very perfumed, elegant, bright, easy drinking. A pretty wine with a touch of caramel sweetness on the finish.

served without decanting around 4½ hours. The nose was reasonably fragrant but a little chalky and dusty. Nice and clean on the palate, though, and the fruit was still there underneath the chalky notes. After nearly 7 hours the dustiness cleared up and the nose was much nicer.

Double decanted (for 2 hours) - side by side next to a '12 Hudelot-Baillet Bonnes Mares. By comparison, this was much more Chambolle-esque: lighter in color, softer tannins, and more strawberries. The oak might need a little more time for integration but this is stunning already - and was the preferred out of the two Bonnes Mares bottlings tonight.

La Paulée NYC Grand Tasting (Pier Sixty) : Quite dense. Some raspberry with long finish of cured meats. 5+ years will do this good.

Small taste. More red than black lean fruits with the power you expect from Bonnes Mares. Big, long, needing lots more air and time in the cellar.

Scents of flowers, berries and forest floor waft out of the bottle on opening. Juicy and deep wave of dark fruit on the palette followed by a long slightly austere finish. Powerful yet svelte wine! This has yet to reach cruising altitude in my opinion, but it’s got the stuffing to be great as it comes into balance. While decanting helps, i’m going to let my other bottles sleep for 5 years.

Decanted for 3+hrs by the time it was served (blinded). This came after a flight of ‘14 Clos de Tart & ‘14 Remi Jeanniard which were both beautiful (with the CdT edging the Jeanniard with more intensity & concentration), and another ‘13 Fourrier Chambolle Gruenchers served alongside this Bonnes Mares. I had remarked how coincidental it was for 4 of us to have brought Burgs clustered around the Chambolle<->MSD communes, with 3 (out of 4) the same vintage even. This …

Decanted for ~2-hrs, this was served (blinded) alongside the '10 Bertheau BM in a 3-flight of 2 (6 Bonnes Mares). Beautiful Chambolle-like florals with violets/spice & black-cherries. This still had discernable oak on the palate but was very well integrated (to borrow the same phrase from my previous note - "nary a hair out of place"), with great freshness, lift/purity & elegance. Together with the '10 Bertheau BM, these 2 were the favourites amongst most of us... I don't normally …

Profund deep scent of red and dark berries, earthy. Deep taste on the palate, with fine fruit and juicy acidity. Long and balanced, really tasty now after four hours in the decanter. Great with food and needs air.

Decanted for almost 3+ hrs before we got to it... This was impressive - dark-fruits (both nose & palate, w/ black cherries) & Asian-spice with power, structure, but at the same time "clean", fresh/great-lift and nary a hair out of place. Silky, sappy, power w/o weight. Some thought this was a Mugnier BM... This is going to be classy with time/age...

BM Dinner (Summer Pavilion) : Still too youthful. A lots of crunchy primary fruits with oak showing at the back. Very fine tannin, excellent acidity and fruits with good structured for further developing. Very juicy! Compared to the 2014 Bertheau this is definitely possess more weight and larger scale.

2014 red Burgundy tasting w/ incredible whites served blind (Eddie V's - Tysons Corner, VA) : This is a manimal! Perhaps the biggest wine of the night. The initial note is mint but it dissipates. Intense nose displaying very ripe coiled black fruit, blackberry cooked in sugar, fresh black cherry, licorice, coffee, root beer and earth. Excellent concentration, densely layered black fruit, unctuous but not heavy, bright acidity, strong earthy mineral and a long intense dense black fruit driven finish. …

Tasted at a big Lucien Le Moine Tasting with approximately 30 wines. Wow... another highlight and a contender for WOTN. If "Les Amoureuses" was the ballerina and all about finesse, the "Bonnes Mares" is all about power, structure, density but with incredible class shining through too. Super impressive notes of dark red and dark berries, coffee, tobacco, earth, sweet dark spices like cloves and licorice, but also some savory notes like pepper. It's full-bodied, dense and powerful, with high acidity …

Unique in burgundy. It's first for Pinot. 25 centuries ago. Bonnes mares is also east north and south white limestone up, brown down. Nobody has that same character. Mother rock and Mother Nature. The two others are ok in this place. It's not a part of the grand cru. It's exactly everything. Everything is in bonnes mares. Nothing can be richer than that. 2002 and 2009 and 2014 is his favorite. One of the nicest bonnes mares he can live …