Product 13/156

2004 Arnoux Echezeaux

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Year: 2004 Appellation: Echezeaux Country: France Burghound Rating: 91-93	$115.00
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Burghound Issue 21
Producer note: As I commented in Issue 17, Pascal Lachaux is on a roll and his 2004s are first rate in the context of the vintage, indeed his performance is arguably among the very best period in 2004. Lachaux commented that "2004 is a vintage of the vigneron (where viticulture was more important than winemaking). You basically had to live in the vineyard because if you didn't, there was sure to be oidium, mildew or other problems with the weather conditions that we had. We normally treat 7 to a maximum of 8 times but in 2004, I treated 13 times! Worse, in August it was quite wet which means the vineyards were muddy which means that not only were your treatments less effective (rain washes off the sulfur) but you couldn't get in with your tractor to treat again. We had some hail in Vosne but between Prémeaux and Nuits proper, the vintage was near perfect. We obtained excellent sugars at around 13% and with less than .5% chaptalization, the average wine wound up at 13.3%. I vinified as I usually do though because the seeds were not ripe, I used a special device to remove them and I think this contributed greatly to the more refined tannins we were able to extract. There was a lot of malic acid and thus malos were slow. There were a lot of fine lees, which I left in suspension to dry and add fat and glycerin to the wines. In my view, 2004 is superior to both 2000 and 2001 and they will age well." The wines will be bottled without fining or filtration as usual in January and February. As I noted above, the Arnoux '04s are sensational and while many producers made solid wines from their upper level appellations, Lachaux managed to do it with his villages wines as well plus the Bourgogne is no slouch.

The nose is slightly riper with spicy dark pinot fruit and earth notes leading to rich, sweet, round and powerful flavors packing plenty of punch and volume supported by a dusty and firm tannic spine that is completely buried beneath ample sap. This is impressive and a bit showier than the Clos de Vougeot just now. Burghound 91-93