I tasted the Domaine Trapet 2024s yesterday, but also had the chance to taste their current range from their family domaine in Alsace. I bought some – and why not – aren’t Alsace magnums magnificent? 🙂

Andrée Trapet’s responsibility for her family vines came in 2003. Based in Riquewihr, the domaine is now 30 hectares – larger than their ‘footprint’ in Gevrey-Chambertin. It is Jean-Louis and Andrée’s sons, Louis and Pierre who are responsible for the domaine. As always, the wines see additional ageing in bottle, the grand crus only released 2-3 years after the others:

2024 A Minima Blanc
Sylvaner and Pinot Auxerrois – 4 or 5 others too – but those other cepages are only in small quantities…
Rounder style, slightly creamy with a ripe yellow fruit. Hmm – I was not expecting such a large-scale and juicy wine in the mouth – very aromatic and very delicious…

2024 Riesling Kientzheim
Open, quite airy – not an overt nose of Riesling. Open, juicy – growing in energy – a little extra ripeness of fruit in the middle – lovely juicy, easy style… ‘It’s even better on day two…’

2024 Riesling Riquewihr
Also quite airy but still a fuller and more floral style of aroma. Also super-juicy but more direct in style – a little extra generosity in these flavours but also an extra vibration, a structure even, in this slightly longer finish. Apparently, there’s a little unfinished sugar in this, but I didn’t note it…

2020 Schoenenbourg ‘Premier Cru’
Hmm, spiced and floral too – that’s very attractive. Extra wide with additional concentration, very slowly fading. A beautiful wine…

2020 Schoenenbourg ‘Grand Cru’
Less overt top aromas, but wider and deeper at the base. Extra incisive, beautifully juicy – ooh that’s my kind of wine !! Holding so well with fine energy and just a little confit style to the last notes of fruit – I love it…

They have Rangen Grand Cru for the first time in 2024 – it’s too early to taste that wine for this domaine… The following are two muscat wines – a little too aromatic for my taste, but what lovely juicy energy they have, particularly the last wine with ‘maceration…’

2023 μ (mu) Schoenenbourg (Muscat)
Very aromatic and floral – though not the heavy perfume of a gewurz. Another juicy wine, less impact and density than the 2020 riesling – but with such an impressive width in the finish – I do prefer the riesling though.

2023 Ambre Blanc
This is the muscat again. But made by maceration.
Also, a floral/aromatic but with much extra depth and weight. Extra acidity – this is alive – tension for sure and even a little zesty tannin from the skins. This vibrates with finishing interest and width.

2016 Sporen
Opposite Schoenenburg, this is gewurz… It is harvested 10 days later than other cepages and can have a potential alcohol approaching 20! ‘And gewurz needs to be on the right terroir, if not, I understand why some people won’t like it!’
A more subtle nose – width with a small fizz of energy. Large in scale, layered, sweet for sure – just lacking some finishing interest – it narrows quite quickly after the first hit of sweetness…

2023 Roc des Boutrires, Pouilly-Fuissé
An attractively pale colour. Cushioned fresh citrus – richer at the core. Hmm, a generous wine – it coats the palate with flavour. It could be more incisive, but this flavour is good. Slowly fading. A good wine, but not a wine to search out.
Rebuy – No

2022 Beaujolais Villages Aux Gauthiers
My last bottle. Vines near the Col des Truges – a shame that this exploitation is no more…
Still great, young colour. An inviting dark fruit, and I like this energy too. Tasty, young and juicy. Holding well. There’s a small deposit in the bottle – maybe the last of the tannins – as I didn’t find any in the wine. Delicious !!
Rebuy – Yes

The March 2026 issue of Burgundy-Report, including 50 Reports:
– The 2024 wines of Chablis Part 3
– The (mainly) 2024 wines from Mâcon Part 1
– A Few domaines from the Côte d'Or
Image right: The tractor coming home…

The greatest successes of this issue (alphabetically!):
Jules Desjourneys – 2023 Blancs
Samuel Billaud – 2024
Raveneau – 2024

Don't forget the big summary report of the 2024 Burgundy region vintage
Newly updated:
Vintage 2024

And then all the domaine & tasting visits:

Enjoy !!

The 2019 Champagne? Well, pinot meunier is not my favourite, maybe thanks to that, there were some high-toned esters I didn’t like – but what a wine! Powerful, intense and very long with a strong salinity. This was absolutely a wine that had to be drunk – none left for day two – and also a wine I might consider buying 😉

2022 JJ Archambaud, Vosne-Romanée Aux Réas
Lots of colour. Still a cherry-purple rim. A deep and concentrated nose, unfortunately with quite a lot of creamy oak today – that’s not unfortunate for the future, but my bottle is open today! Wide, intense, a first texture that’s silky but slowly adds some bitters too. Saline, ultra-wide finishing. This is a powerful wine but clearly a bit too young for drinking (with pleasure) today…
Rebuy – Maybe

14 May – my first flowers, Meursault

May 25 mid-flowers – Pinot, Volnay

Chevalier-Montrachet

Chevalier-Montrachet

Corton’s pigs 😉

Absolutely delicious

For later…

Impressively young, but rustic

Best wine of the last 10 days…

Simply excellent…

Well, didn’t that weather change quickly !!

A week ago, we were barely seeing 20°C and the heating in my apartment in Beaune was working to keep a steady 20°C. This week it’s been wall-to-wall 33°C – and at least for the first half of the week, humid too – I now have 26°C in my apartment – and that’s without my heating!

I spotted my first flowers – of course, in the chardonnay – on the 14th of May. That’s the earliest I’ve ever personally seen flowers. It’s always in a wind-shaded but sunny-reflective part of a Meursault 1er Cru. That was, of course, an outlier, but by now we are into mid-flowering in pinot and quite some way through the chardonnay flowering phase.

The weather is ideal for flowering, just a light breeze and over 30°C – all should be finishing in the next few days before the weather changes, cooling and becoming wet – all of which could be true by the middle of next week.

In the Côte d’Or, things are looking very bright after two small volume vintages…

Two 1999s – currently one of my favourite vintages, but not for these two! Both have been stored in the same corner of the cellar for many years. Every wine will be different, and mainly due to the quality of their corks:

1999 Camille Giroud, Bourgogne En Crêots
A wine-saturated cork, though I only broke the first cm. The cork itself smells of oxidised wine – but for older wines (usually 30 years older!) – that’s often the case for a wine-saturated cork, and it doesn’t mean that the wine will be the same.
Medium, medium-plus colour – and no cloudiness. No, there’s hardly any oxidation. Unfortunately, there’s a bit of brett. Direct, silky, plenty of acidity, but also an interesting depth of flavour with a slight accent of oxidation, but no flavour of brett. Long, quite direct and intense finishing. Holding impressively long, a metallic, blood-iron type of flavour, still with some subtle bitters – but no tannic grain. This was potentially a bit of a brute for the first few (15?) years of its life, but it seems quite drinkable – and with a better cork, this would probably be a super Bourgogne.
Rebuy – No but with a better cork, probably.

1999 Michel Gay, Beaune 1er Les Toussaints
What a great cork! Just 2mm of colour from wine ingress – and it comes out in one piece too!
The basic colour is similar to that of the Giroud, but here it’s cloudy and with plenty of sediment that hasn’t settled in 48 hours of ‘uprightness.’ To add to the cloudiness, there’s a pervasive note of brett – really as much as I’ve smelled in a wine for a long time – DNPIM*
Rebuy – No

*Do Not Put In Mouth !!