Pethel’s 2008 Savigny-les-Beaune Les Talemettes – from very old vines in a little-known cru just south of Vergelesses, and a first for Domaine Dublere – combines fresh meat juices and fresh red fruits tinged with pungent herbs in a saline, savory, invigorating, quite palate-staining finish. A bit spare to be sure (and – like several of these 2008s possibly knocked-back a bit by its recent sulfuring), this nonetheless admirably displays the energy of the vintage, and should prove deliciously versatile over at least the next 7-9 years. Asked which of the vintages was more challenging, North Carolina ex-pat Blair Pethel just laughs at first and then says: “I lost more fruit to the tri in ‘07 than I did in ‘08. We had to rush in ‘07 because fruit was rotting on the vines. In ‘08, after the north wind came up and the sun came out, you could wait, and the rot dried out.” I tasted the ‘08s here already at the end of February, just before they were assembled into tank for an expected May bottling. They had lost a bit of color to recent sulfuring, which I suspect had also slightly depressed their fruit, hopefully only temporarily. (In 2009, Pethel practiced an incremental regimen of sulfuring instead.) For more details on his operation – which is a “domaine” only by trademark, as he contracts for most of his fruit – please consult issue 180, where I first reported on the whites, which are show-stoppers in 2008, incidentally, just as they were in 2007. A Becky Wasserman Selection (various importers), Le Serbet; fax 011- 333-80-24-29-70; Pas Mal Selections, New York, NY; tel. (201) 567 2028, Schneider’s of Capital Hill, Washington, DC tel. (202) 543 9300 and Chelsea Ventures,1601 South Canal Street, Chicago, Illinois 60616 tel (847) 920-5052

This is more elegant still with its cool red pinot fruit, stone and more subtle earth-suffused nose that complements the detailed, supple and utterly delicious flavors that seem like they are formed from essence of pinot, all wrapped in a linear and balanced finish.