It was a simple beet salad with goat
cheese and walnuts and some scallops with
persillade, suddenly catapulted into a world
class dining experience by Paul Garaudet's
2006 Puligny Montrachet.
I think it's the best Puligny Montrachet I've
tasted from Paul and it got me thinking about
Burgundy and why the wine and the region are
so compelling.
Burgundy is a small ancestral gaggle of
villages with this amazing collection of
different terroirs i.e. all these
vineyards right next door to each other or
down the road, with unique soils and
exposures and micro-climates putting out
distinct wines with personalities that come
right from the earth.
When you become involved in Burgundy you
can't escape its charm and the powerful urge
to find out more and more about each of its
wines. It becomes a challenge in the most
gratifying way to get to the bottom of
Burgundy and each delving is usually paired
with seriously great meals and like-minded
Burgundy lovers who, of course, are some of
the world's most interesting people.
Did you read Eric Asimov's column in the New
York Times? He was interviewing
David Chan, a violinist and Burgundy lover.
David talks about how
music is like Burgundy.
"Great composers are like great vineyards.
Both require a particular sort of
selflessness to bring them to life. If you
seek to only be yourself, that's what you
get, but if you seek to faithfully bring the
composer to life that will happen, and your
personality will enter the picture because
you're performing the task. I think the same
thing happens in wine. If you try to
faithfully capture the terroir, inevitably
you enter the picture, whereas if you're not
careful, it results in a house style."
Wine first, winemaker second. This is how the
great winemakers of Burgundy think.
To get back to the Puligny Montrachet: It was
perfect. The flavors were up front in the
nose and rounded on the palate and there were
layers of fabulous minerals and fruit.
But, what of the 2006 white Burgundies?
I
have tasted a lot of them and find them
consistently my style. And, it was a
particularly brilliant year for Puligny
Montrachet.
"As the various Burghound.com Selections will
confirm, among the 'Big Three,' the star of
2006, like in 2004 and 2005, is
undoubtedly Puligny-Montrachet followed
closely by Meursault" - Allen Meadows,
Burghound
Allen Meadows goes on to say, "...the wines
are indisputably delicious, round, rich and
generous with opulent middles and just
enough
supporting acidity to maintain focus and
balance. They are also, again for the most
part, very forward and will drink well almost
immediately."
My heart starts to race when I see a Puligny
Montrachet on the table and for most of you
it's the same, but I'll finish with Matt
Kramer's description of Puligny Montrachet to
get some cardiac rise out of you newcomers:
"the white wine of Puligny is always taut.
Green and gold are its colors. High acidity
is its trademark. Long life is its
prerogative. Other wines have all of these
distinctions yet none taste quite like
Puligny. None have that taut bowstring
tension of taste. The gout de terroir
of Puligny seems somehow more sharply etched
than elsewhere. The fruit is defined and
powerful yet restrained like the musculature
of a martial artist."
There. That should get you to the Emergency
Room. Cynthia Hurley
