From 1987 through 2019, I visited Burgundy at least once a year to taste for this publication. In 2020 and 2021, the COVID pandemic prevented my visiting; in 2022, I chose not to visit because of the very small quantities produced in 2021 and also because I had conflicting obligations that fall.
The first week in June of this year I finally returned, primarily to taste the wines from 2022, although some producers chose to show 2021s and earlier instead. It was an emotional homecoming, and I will be back to taste more this coming fall.
Although I missed tasting 2019 and 2020 in the cellars, I have already drunk enough of those vintages from bottle to say that along with 2018, they represent hot-weather vintages with quite a bit of inconsistency. Some wines are relatively classic (although with somewhat riper fruit) and others have gone too far with high alcohols (above 14% even from some good producers) and overripe fruits that recall Southern Rhône wines instead of Burgundy. I would say that there are two schools of thought about (1) those three vintages on the one hand, and (2) 2017, the last classic vintage before 2021, on the other hand: some will prefer the former and others will prefer the latter.
The first good news about 2022 is that it is a vintage that will probably unite both schools in their intense enthusiasm for the wines, certainly for the reds and probably for the whites (of which I tasted fewer of than the reds in 2022). The wines are fresh and precise, well reflective of their respective terroirs, but with smooth, often silky, textures that make them especially pleasurable.
The second good news about 2022 is that it is a vintage where producers generally made the fully-allotted yields, in sharp contrast to 2018-19-20, where production was often far short of the permitted yields. As I write this, the flowering has gone well in Burgundy in 2023, and so barring widespread damage from hail or disease, it is for the moment looking like a second-consecutive full-volume vintage of potential high quality: just what is needed to begin to attack the supply-side shortage of Burgundy.
As for vintage conditions in 2022, there’s not a lot to say. The flowering went well, and at the end of June, just as the vines were feeling the dryness, there were some showers that provided the water needed to carry through the summer. Harvesting generally took place the second and third weeks of September. On the Côte de Nuits, there was some rain to provide further benefits just before the harvest, with the rain being substantial the further one went north to Gevrey-Chambertin.
Based on the tastings I did in the first week of June, 2022 is potentially the finest vintage I have tasted in Burgundy since I began tasting in the cellars in the mid-1980s. However, there are some important qualifications to that statement:
- This statement is based on a very limited number of domaines tasted.
- Since 1991, I have always tasted the wines in October and November of the year following the vintage. This was the first time since 1991 that I have tasted in the spring following the vintage. That said, the main advantage in tasting in October and November is that malolactic fermentations have almost all finished. But because of very low malic acidities in the 2022s, almost all wines I tasted had already finished their malos.
- Comparing vintages across time is problematic, just as comparing paintings, music, literature, athletic achievements, etc. across time is problematic: producers in a given era are responding to environments, problems, and questions that are of their era and not the same as those faced by producers in a different era. For wine, there is no question that global warming has changed the game in recent years and continues to do so. In particular, for Burgundy, the prospect of a vintage without sufficient ripeness is almost unthinkable these days, whereas the prospects of wines with excess alcohol and ripeness of fruit and deficient acidity are constant challenges. So far, conscientious estates have mostly been able to meet the challenges, but as 2018 showed (and 2019 and 2020, too, although I am less familiar with them), in some instances, conscientious producers could not preserve Burgundy typicality across the board.
In the posts to follow, interrupted from time to time by posts on other wines, I shall recount the wines tasted on my trip.