2023 Gevrey Chambertin Evocelles

The 2023 Gevrey-Chambertin Les Evocelles includes 30% whole bunch, and that works to its advantage, lending a "coolness" and "spiciness" to the mixture of red and black fruit-far better than the Gevrey Village. The palate is medium-bodied with fine tannins, good weight and commendable persistency, lightly spiced with a dash of cracked black pepper and Earl Grey toward the finish. This should age well in bottle. "The 2023 vintage was great," Sylvie Poillot says, beaming. "Of course, we did a green harvest in June, continuing into July for some parcels, as there were too many grapes. I noticed nine bunches per vine in Gevrey-Chambertin La Justice, also Savigny-lès-Beaune, so we cut it to four per vine. August was cool. We started picking on August 30 and finished September 28, starting with the whites and finishing with the Evocelles in Gevrey. It was a long harvest, as we wanted to wait for ripening, stopping for two days when there was rain on September 19 and 20. The yield is 53 hl/ha for the whites and 43 hl/ha for the reds. There was no chaptalization. The highest alcohol was in Charmes-Chambertin at 13.5%, but around 12.5% average for the reds." "We are now doing a shorter élevage. We use five different coopers: Damy and Chassin for the whites, with the reds in Rousseau, Mercurey and François Frères. We receive the wood in June with medium toasting, a mixture of 228, 350 and 450- liter barrels. No more than 20% new oak is used across the range. Bottling was in December instead of April (since 2021). Also, we are now bottling using Trescases instead of Amorim. There will be new cuvées in 2024: 0.40-hectares in Mazoyères- Chambertin, land farmed by Arnaud Mortet that has now been acquired."

The 2023 Gevrey-Chambertin Les Evocelles includes 30% whole bunch, and that works to its advantage, lending a "coolness" and "spiciness" to the mixture of red and black fruit—far better than the Gevrey Village. The palate is medium-bodied with fine tannins, good weight and commendable persistency, lightly spiced with a dash of cracked black pepper and Earl Grey toward the finish. This should age well in bottle.