2023 Meursault Clos des Ecoles

The 2023 Meursault Clos des École has quite a honeyed bouquet that feels just a little late-picked. The palate is sweet and again, a little honeyed on the entry, with low acidity. It's open with a charming brioche- and orange pith-tinged finish. This is early- drinking. Charles van Canneyt is a bit stressed. His plane was delayed from San Sebastián, which meant a last-minute rejigging of my afternoon schedule. The silver lining is that it allowed more time, since his was my last visit of the day. Not only could I taste the wines from Hudelot-Nöellat, but also the first three wines from his Domaine des Chezeaux project. This is going forward now that negotiations with Laurent Ponsot reached an amicable conclusion, and I will taste the extended range next year. "We knew it would be a generous vintage, but we weren't expecting quantities like this," van Canneyt admits. "We did a green harvest in some vineyards, mostly in the Bourgogne Rouge and one or two in Chambolle with respect to the younger vines. This helped control yields. We had very warm weather during harvest, so we had to pick early. We began on September 11. There are a lot of differences between producers [in terms of when to pick]. We had to be quick, as the sanitary conditions were declining, but fortunately we have a large team of 50 pickers plus 15 carriers. I decided to do a saignée, which is something my grandfather used to do. I was a bit nervous at first. We removed the riper juice to keep grapes with more acidity, and this helped to naturally concentrate the wines, which is easier to extract. Everything is destemmed as usual, with aging in a maximum of 50% new oak for the Grand Crus. Some of the malos finished just two weeks ago, and I added some SO2 afterwards. I am happy because the wines are ripe but not overripe, refreshing compared to 2019 and 2022. They will probably drink earlier, but the balance means that they should age well."