The Classic 2016 : Leflaive 樂飛雙雞Macon-Verze Blanc 白酒 2016
I tasted this time with director Brice de La Morandière along with new régisseur (estate manager) Pierre Vincent who was hired away from Domaine de la Vougeraie. They told me that 2016 'gave us a lot of difficulty with the frost and mildew but we managed reasonably well under the circumstances.
While May and June weren't great, thereafter we enjoyed fine conditions that allowed the vines to bring the remaining fruit to excellent maturity. We chose to begin picking on the 21st of September and the happily the fruit was spotless so there was essentially almost no sorting required. The frost though cost us severely in terms of yield as they were off 50% overall but 75 to 80% in the grands crus, which is obviously painful for a variety of reasons.
And of course there will be no Montrachet, at least not 100% from our owned vines. But the losses were markedly disparate because as hard hit as the grands crus were, yields were about normal in Blagny, Clavoillon and Folatières. As to the wines, they are impressively concentrated with excellent terroir transparency; indeed the word classic is a good descriptor. By Allen Meadows.
