The 2016 Richebourg Grand Cru comes from a single parcel within Les Verroilles that was picked on 30 September and includes 45% whole-bunch fruit and 40% new oak. It has a very classy bouquet with a mixture of red and black fruit, sous bois and morels, all very well defined and endowed with a sense of grandeur. The palate is medium-bodied with fine tannin, crisp acidity, lovely focus and tension with veins of spice toward the finish. It does not possess the weight and substance of a completely untroubled growing season, yet there is class interwoven into every pore of this wine.

Tasted blind at the Burgundy 2011 horizontal tasting in Beaune. The Richebourg 2011 has a more extravagant, bold, multilayered bouquet with blackberry, wild strawberry, hints of undergrowth and light marine influences coming in to play: very complex. The palate still has some unresolved oak on the entry, but there is great tension and vibrancy here, the tannins fine and lending this great tension. I would not broach a bottle now because there is so much to give in the future. Just like in the blind Amoureuses tasting in Holland, here Bichot proves itself as one of the top-flight producers. Bravo!