Fontaine Gagnard Caillerets 2017

Offering up aromas of apple blossom, crisp orchard fruit, dried white flowers and honeycomb, the lovely 2017 Chassagne-Montrachet 1er Cru Les Caillerets is medium to full-bodied, satiny and expansive, with a lovely line of animating acidity, a deep core and a long, pure finish. As usual, Cécile Fontaine had bottled her 2017s just before harvest 2018, so I had the pleasure of tasting finished wines that will be entirely representative of the bottles that readers can buy. Succulent and defined by site, it’s a lovely vintage at this address—which I’ve been visiting since my student days—and one that plays to the strengths of the domaine’s pure, elegant and aromatic house style. Thanks to the generous crops of 2017 and 2018, plans are afoot to extend the domaine’s cellars, opening up the possibility of longer sur lie élevage. Perhaps more space will permit other refinements of technique, too? My suggested drinking windows for these wines err on the side of caution, as in the past Fontaine-Gagnard has suffered from the scourge of premature oxidation, a problem that Céline is the first to acknowledge, but they are beautifully balanced wines so in a perfect world they might well mature in the cellar for quite a lot longer.