There is only one barrel of the 2015 Meursault Gouttes d'Or this year. It has a composed bouquet with scents of grilled almond and hazelnut, smoke emerging in the background. The palate is very well balanced with a slightly viscous opening, plenty of lemongrass and ginger notes with tangy marmalade towards the finish. There is quite a lot going on here and it may improve by the time of bottling.

The 2010 Meursault Goutte d’Or is hard to taste after the Charmes, Perrieres and Genevrieres, as it is a smaller scaled wine. Pears, apples, white flowers and minerals are woven together nicely in this subtle, intensely perfumed Meursault. Although the Goutte d’Or doesn’t quite have the pedigree of the top Meursaults, in exchange it will drink well upon release. This is the only Meursault premier cru Jadot purchases as wine (as opposed to must and/or grapes) and it is quite different in personality than the other Meursaults in the lineup. Anticipated maturity: 2012+. Once again, I tasted with Jacques Lardiere and Frederic Barnier during a marathon session that lasted several hours. Lardiere has been on a whirlwind tour celebrating his last year at Jadot before his long-announced retirement, but I will believe he is stepping down when I see it. Lifers like Lardiere simply don’t retire. As for the wines, Jadot’s 2010s are unqualified successes across the board. Of course, the wines from the most prestigious appellations are often compelling, but frankly I find just as much joy in discovering the many fabulous Burgundies from unheralded villages that are sprinkled throughout this portfolio. Lardiere and Barnier first thought 2010 was better for reds than whites, but that gap has narrowed recently in their opinion. Yields were down 15-20% for the whites (less than the reds), because of the December, 2009 frost and irregular flowering the following spring. A number of wines were chaptalized approximately 0.5%. The 2010 whites were bottled between February and March 2012. I also tasted a handful of 2009s and 2008s, which I have included here as part of my goal to revisit wines from bottle on a regular basis. I continue to be thrilled by the Jadot 2009 whites, while the 2008s I tasted are mostly equally succesful. Jadot fans know that this venerable winery is composed of several brands; Maison Louis Jadot, Domaine Louis Jadot, Heritiers de Louis Jadot, Domaine Duc de Magenta and Domaine Gagey. In the interest of simplicity, I have listed all of the wines in this section under Domaine/Maison Jadot. There are two cases in which a wine is made by more than one of the labels, in which case the corresponding tasting note indicates which wine was tasted; they are the Chassagne-Montrachet premier cru Garenne and the Puligny-Montrachet premier cru Folatieres. Importer: Kobrand Corp., Purchase, NY; tel. (914) 253-7756