Domaine Fourrier   Gevrey Chambertin Clos St Jacques

2007 Gevrey Chambertin Clos St Jacques

By Domaine Fourrier

Exploring the Nuances of the 2007 Gevrey Chambertin Clos St Jacques from Domaine Fourrier

In the pantheon of Burgundy's cherished terroirs, the 2007 vintage in Gevrey Chambertin stands as a testament to the grace that can be achieved in a challenging year. Among these expressions of viticultural triumph, the 2007 Gevrey Chambertin Clos St Jacques from Domaine Fourrier offers the sophisticated investor an opportunity to treasure and perhaps capitalize on a wine of deft complexity and nuance.

 

A Vintage Rising Above Expectations

The year 2007 began with trepidation across Burgundy's vintners. An unwelcome frost in April cast early aspersions on what would fortunately resolve into a season marked by a mild summer and an early harvest. The integrity and resilience of Domaine Fourrier's vines, particularly those venerable parcels within Clos St Jacques, surmounted the climatic vicissitudes to yield fruit with a mesmerizing balance between ripeness and acidity.

 

Time-Honoured Craftsmanship Meets Nature's Caprice

This wine unfurls with an intricate tapestry of red cherry and subtle game, intertwined with whispers of violet and a dignified earthiness characteristic of this climat. The palate is greeted with an ensemble of mature tannins that achieves a paradoxical dance of structure and silkiness courtesy of Domaine Fourrier's noninterventionist philosophy. The 2007 vintage weathered its capricious beginnings to offer a dénouement defined by finesse rather than power.

Investing in fine wines like the 2007 Gevrey Chambertin Clos St Jacques requires appreciating not just the timeless splendour of Burgundy, but also understanding how each distinctive season imprints upon its creations. This selection from Domaine Fourrier, while overlooked in its infancy, has unfurled into an articulate expression of its terroir that now commands respect from collectors and connoisseurs alike.

 

The Collector’s Conundrum: To Sip or Not to Sip?

The wine collector's rationale must often vacillate between the temptation to indulge immediately and the patience for potential appreciation. In our consideration of the 2007 Gevrey Chambertin Clos St Jacques from Domaine Fourrier, we find a compelling argument for both. Here lies a vintage that bridges the gap – assuredly peaking in its drinking window yet steadfast in its investment appeal. It is a rare gem within our vinous landscape, seamlessly aligning temporal intrigue with financial prudence.

Current market price

£6,620.00

12x75cl

Highest score

92

POP score

551.67

Scores and tasting notes

92

Ripe red currant and raspberry, crushed stone, game, and damp bark-like woodsy notes emerge from the nose of Fourrier’s 2007 Gevrey-Chambertin Clos St.-Jacques that also displays bouillon-like saline, and meaty depth. Firmly tannic and impressively dense, this lacks the alluring floral dimension one expects from this site and gets so prominently in the 2008 rendition, but it certainly boasts formidable overall intensity and palate-staining berry fruit, meats, and minerals. I would give it a couple of years in bottle before revisiting and expect a dozen or more years of stamina. Jean-Claude Fourrier left no doubt that he viewed 2008 under the aspect of a return to times and conditions he thought his generation would never have to face. “The most important determinant of quality in your range,” in 2008, he asserted, “was how willing you were to sacrifice on the sorting table.” He had only just bottled his 2008s when I tasted them at the end of February – with the exception of two wines that remained in tank, one a Combottes he had just warmed-up in a last ditch effort to push it across the lactic conversion line! “By last October,” he explains, “I was facing the situation that 5 casks out of 7 were at 80% of malic acid and the others at 20%. So you have the choice either to heat your cellar, or to make the – for me, painful – decision to bring the wine back together into vat for promoting natural inoculation. Otherwise, I would have been waiting until April, and I can hardly even consider two full years in cask for my wines To be honest, I hated my ‘08s for the first 14 months.” Primary fermentation also took place this year in large part through inoculation by utilizing whichever lots spontaneously kicked-in first as starters, because as Fourrier explained, “I’m not a fan of extended cold maceration, which means adding sulfur,” and with the ambient temperatures at which the 2008 fruit arrived in the press house, it could have taken a long time for many fermentations to commence. Potential alcohols were in the low to mid 11s, and boosted by at most a degree, lower total alcohol being one throwback to “the old days” that Fournier appreciates, “except,” as he notes, that back “in those days growers were mistakenly fixated on sugar, and chaptalization.” Fourrier finds his 2007s phenolically riper than his 2008s, but they were not showing an especially user-friendly side on the occasion when I tasted them, leading me to wonder where they’re headed, or whether they were experiencing a collective period of withdrawal. (For more about Fourrier’s always articulately and thoughtfully expressed methods – as well as about his vineyards – consult my reports in issues 170 and 186.) Importer: Rosenthal Wine Merchant, Pine Plains, NY; tel. (800) 910-1990

David Schildknecht - The Wine Advocate, 28 June 2010

Vintage performance