Burgundy 2017: Full en primeur report

'When it’s good, 2017 is very good indeed' says Tim Atkin MW in his 2017 Burgundy en primeur report. See his full vintage overview...

2017 reds

Supple tannins and lots of sweet fruit in the reds

3.5/5

2017 whites

Focus, freshness and minerality in the early-picked whites

4/5

‘When it’s good, 2017 is very good indeed’

Burgundy experienced something it hadn’t seen for eight years in 2017: a large vintage of mostly good quality wines, both red and white.

With the significant exception of Chablis, which was hit by frost, mildew and hail, and a few isolated spots in Morey-St-Denis, St-Aubin and Rully, the growing season was gratifyingly free of vineyard diseases and what climatologists call ‘weather events’.

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Volumes are large – this is one of Burgundy’s largest-ever red wine crops – which means that most growers and négociants finally have some wine to sell. ‘It’s satisfying in every sense,’ commented Michel Coutoux of Domaine Michel Niellon.

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Burgundy 2017 en primeur reports:

Chablis

Côte Chalonnaise & Mâconnais

Côte de Nuits 

Côte de Beaune

Top value red wines

Top value white wines

Top scoring wines

The 2017 season

The year began with a cold winter – something that has become increasingly unusual in the region – with three weeks of sub-zero temperatures in January. Spring, on the other hand, was mild and dry, leading to an early bud-burst and flowering, 20 days ahead of 2015.

‘We dodged a bullet’ – Bertrand Chevillon

The freezing temperatures that did such damage in Chablis also descended on the rest of Burgundy in the second half of April, but a combination of luck, dry soils and the collaborative effort of producers who lit bales of damp straw to create a protective smokescreen, helped to avert disaster. ‘We dodged a bullet,’ Bertrand Chevillon told me.

After that, the year began to hot up, with rapid growth in the vineyards. The thermometer recorded a temperature of 39°C in Vosne-Romanée on 21 June, marking the first of two heat spikes – the other one came at the end of August.

There was some rain in mid-July, late August and early September, but this was still a hot vintage where some vines suffered stress from lack of water.

It was also a very early vintage for many Burgundians. Arnaud Ente led the way on 23 August, with many top white wine producers following his lead and picking before the end of the month. The red wine harvest started in the first week of September and continued until the end of the month in the Hautes Côtes.

One local journalist accused the early pickers of making base wine for Crémant de Bourgogne, but there’s no denying that this was a vintage when acidity levels were low at the end of the summer and fell rapidly thereafter. In September, potential alcohol levels increased at more than twice the normal rate.

A legacy of frost

2017 was also shaped by what happened in 2016, when Burgundy experienced one of its worst-ever frosts. Affected vineyards often over-compensate in the ensuing vintage, which is what happened in 2017, just as it did in 1982, 1992 and 1999.

Frost-ravaged villages such as Marsannay, Chambolle-Musigny, parts of Nuits-St-Georges, Meursault and Chassagne-Montrachet were especially prone to high yields. Some growers opted to try to ripen larger crops – not always successfully it must be said – while others carried out one or more green harvests. This is one of the reasons why 2017 is such a heterogeneous vintage.

Comparisons

Does 2017 resemble another year? The heat and the early harvest reminded some producers of 2007 and 2011, although it’s better than both.

Other comparisons included 1979, 1987, 1989, 1990, 1995, 1997, 1999, 2000, 2002, 2014 and 2015 (but with more freshness), which just goes to show that opinions vary, even within Burgundy. A mixture of 2007, 2011 and 2014 probably comes closest to describing the style of the best wines.

Quality

How good are they? I think it’s an exaggeration to call 2017 a ‘superb harvest’, as the estimable Aubert de Villaine of Domaine de la Romanée-Conti has done, but there are definitely patches of excellence, especially among the whites, which seem to cope better with the combination of heat and high yields. Pinot Noir always was a fragile grape.

Overall, these are wines for comparatively early drinking, although Charles van Canneyt of Domaine Hudelot-Noëllat is not alone in thinking that they may age better than people imagine.

Several Burgundians described the 2017s as ‘restaurant wines’ or even ‘swimming-pool wines’ but that’s a little unfair in my view. They are a pleasure to drink in many cases, with supple tannins and lots of sweet fruit in the reds, and focus, freshness and minerality in the early picked whites.

‘My advice would be to buy while exercising a degree of caution’

Pricing

The 2017 could easily be overlooked by Burgundy drinkers, situated as it is between the superior 2016 vintage and the powerful, already hyped 2018s, which would be a shame.

Prices are unlikely to come down – partly as a result of the weak pound, but also as a reflection of the cost of land and grapes in Burgundy, and producers’ understandable desire to put some money in the bank after seven smaller crops.

My advice would be to buy while exercising a degree of caution. When it’s good, 2017 is very good indeed. When it’s bad, you’d be better off buying what’s left of the 2014s, 2015s and 2016s instead.

Producers to watch:

Domaine Bernard & Thierry Glantenay (Volnay)

Domaine Chantal Lescure (Nuits-St-Georges)

Domaine Cornin (Pouilly-Fuissé)

Domaine David Moreau (Santenay)

Domaine de L’Evêché (Mercurey)

Domaine Guillemot-Michel (Quintaine)

Domaine Anne & Hervé Sigaut (Chambolle-Musigny)

Domaine Launay-Horiot (Pommard)

Domaine Lecheneaut (Nuits-St-Georges)

Mark Haisma (Négociant)

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