2022 Volnay Clos des Ducs 1. Cru Marquis d'Angerville

The grand vin of the domaine is not the deepest in colour. A wonderful perfume, the most delicate of roses yet with a force of its own, while the little red fruits are very subtle too. This is a wonderful gracious and graceful wine, giving me sheer pleasure even in its infancy. It is constructed in so much detail, little pinpricks of red fruited pleasure throughout, with the precision of long-term biodynamics allied to this vintage of entirely healthy fruit.

The 2022 Volnay Clos des Ducs 1er Cru is another to add to the canon of outstanding wines from this monopole. It has retained the bouquet with mineral-laden dark berry fruit, perhaps less tea-leaf scents and more of the forest floor. Very well defined. The palate is medium-bodied with filigree tannins, a little more grip than it demonstrated from barrel with a structured finish. It is unapologetically classic in style, far more reserved and less fleshy than its peers in this vintage, but it exudes breeding.

The 2022 Volnay 1er Cru Clos des Ducs is lovely, unwinding in the glass with aromas of red berries and cherries mingled with peonies, warm spices, potpourri and orange zest. Medium to full-bodied, fleshy and pure, with a deep and multidimensional core of fruit, lively acids and refined tannins, it concludes with a long, saline finish.

This wine is inevitably among the great wines from d'Angerville's cellar, but it takes a while to get there. Out of barrel, it lacks the generosity of the Champans; Guillaume d'Angerville opines that it is more 'Cistercian'; by this, he perhaps means more strict, linear, and disciplined. It is substantial and has an admirable depth of flavour, with aromas of currant and plum developing on the palate with hints of cigar leaf, cedar, and earth. Ideally wait seven to 10 years from the vintage to open and drink over the next 20.

(a monopole that measures 2.15 ha). This is the only wine in the range to be firmly reduced and aromatically unreadable. Otherwise, there is excellent size, weight and mid-palate concentration to the compact, austere and more muscular flavors that culminate in a strikingly long, mineral-driven and compact finale. This youthfully austere effort is potentially brilliant and should age for a very long time, indeed much like the Taillepieds, it’s going to need it.