2015 Domaine Faiveley ‘Les Cazetiers’ Gevrey-Chambertin 1er Cru

BH 92-95: Deeply pitched aromas of newly turned earth and animale notes characterize the brooding but notably ripe spiced plum and red berry fruit nose. The rich, full-bodied and tautly muscled flavors exhibit buckets of sappy dry extract that all but disguises the firm tannic spine on the immensely long and explosive finish. Cazetiers doesn’t get a whole lot better than this.

Erwan Faiveley described 2015 as a “great vintage for quality but not for quantity because there was a lot of shatter during the flowering. We chose to begin picking on the 2nd of September and overall the fruit was as clean as I have ever seen. Potential alcohols were excellent coming in as they did between 13 and 14%. Yields were quite disparate at between 25 and 35 hl/ha with very thick skins that natural gave us high solid to liquid ratios. As such we were very careful with the vinifications as it would have been very easy to over-extract the reds. Moreover because the stems were ripe and clean, we used more whole clusters than usual, which is to say between 25 and 30% for almost 75% of our wines. We also chose to lower the proportion of new wood somewhat with the balance being mostly from one year old wood. As to quality, I would say that 2015 was better in the Côte de Nuits than the Côte de Beaune and particularly from Chambolle to Gevrey. But I am also exceptionally happy with the quality of the reds from the Côte Chalonnaise.” Since the internal decision was taken to change many things about the Faiveley wines in 2007, the wines have steadily improved and in particular have become more consistent. Acquisitions have of course helped as have new equipment (in particular the new vertical presses) along with throwing out much of the older oak that was giving inelegant tannins. The very fine quality of the Faiveley 2015s is of course partially due to the excellence of the vintage but I credit their commitment to raising the standard of their game as well. By the way, for those readers searching for a good, and serious, value play, considering picking up some of the Mercurey “Clos du Roy”; I believe that you will be impressed by the quality.