2006 Burgundy

Preliminary tasting last January from Barrel and this January from bottle (for the most part) has shown this vintage to be strong and immensely useful. The 2005 red vintage yielded big, rich and ripe wines replete with abundant tannin and appropriate acidity. Wines that will be charming because of their fruit...but...for God's sake put them in the cellar. They need significant time to really show the greatness in the bottle. I do not mean 3 years. I mean 10 for Premier Crus and 15 for Grand Crus to begin to show their quality. The '06's behind them are ripe and charming and much more supple, less tannic and will drink at least 5 years earlier at peak in the same wines. Probably at the same time as the 02's begin to show their stuff. For the restaurants the 06's will help us put some of the top 05's to sleep.

As a side note I have noticed more bass notes from 03's (those that were from good wines from this very inconsistent year). This means that many of them are about to go to sleep I believe and will reawaken at various rates as even more dense, throaty wines with Châteauneuf-du-Pape - like functionality as they peak.