Wine Advisor
Taupenot Merme, Charmes Chambertin Grand Cru 2014
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Description
Tasting notes
Reviewed by: Stephen Tanzer
Bright, dark red. Captivating floral high tones to the aromas of cherry and dark raspberry. Silky, sappy, deep and rich, offering a creamy sweetness to its almost unctuous red fruit, spice and underbrush flavors. Here's a 2014 with more than enough mid-palate stuffing to coat its tannins. Taupenot suggests holding this wine for eight or nine years for more complexity.
Reviewed by: Stephen Tanzer
(true Charmes): Medium red. Sexy, high-toned nose offers scents of black raspberry, crushed cherry, rose petal and smoked meat. Sappy red berry and rose petal flavors boast terrific intensity and energy without any undue weight. Finishes with outstanding rising length, the firm tannins outlasted by fruits and flowers. A lovely Charmes. This vineyard was partly replanted in 1998 but was originally planted at the same time as Taupenot's Mazoyères--and the Mazoyères of Taupenot's cousin Christophe Perrot-Minot (their mothers are sisters).
Reviewed by: Neal Martin
Tasted blind at the Burgfest 2014 tasting, the 2014 Charmes Chambertin Grand Cru from Domaine Taupenot-Merme was a little skinny on the nose and needs more fruit and presence to develop in bottle. The palate is medium-bodied with slightly dry tannin, a bony Charmes-Chambertin that tapers in toward the oaky finish, though it gains flesh in the glass, and I suspect decanting would see this wine put on more weight. But here it was surpassed by Romain Taupenot's superb Mazoyères-Chambertin. I will seek to revisit this. Tasted September 2017.
Reviewed by: Neal Martin
The 2014 Charmes Chambertin Grand Cru has a pretty, quite floral bouquet with wilted rose petal infusing the brambly red berry fruit, nicely defined and more expressive than the Corton Rognet at the moment. The palate is succulent and fresh on the entry with a gentle grip in the mouth, quite saline and structured; it is more Mazoyères than Charmes in some ways, demonstrating impressive density and backbone on the finish. This is a sublime expression of the vineyard, a great wine with a long future ahead.
About the Producer
Romain Taupenot is the ninth generation to run this family domaine in Morey-Saint-Denis. While records show his ancestors practiced viticulture as far back as the 17th century, the domaine as we know it today truly came to be after the marriage of Romain’s parents, Denise Merme and Jean Taupenot, in 1963. The domaine’s diverse vineyard sites across both the Côte de Nuits and Côte de Beaune can be traced back to this union of holdings from the Taupenot family, based in Saint-Romain, with those belonging to the Mermes, from Morey-Saint-Denis. With 9 hectares in the Côte de Nuits and another 4.5 hectares in the Côte de Beaune, Romain and Virginie now produce nineteen different wines across seventeen appellations. A significant portion of their holdings are in premier cru and grand cru appellations, and all of their premiers crus are enviably placed. Old vines represent a significant proportion of the domaine’s holdings, with new plantings created from sélection massale cuttings of their best vines. Having farmed organically since 2001, the Taupenots seek to respect the character of each climat to yield wines of purity and grace that are faithful to their appellation of origin. Romain jokingly refers to himself as a “lazy winemaker,” prioritizing work in the vineyard in order to minimize the need for intervention in the cellar. Their hand-harvested grapes are de-stemmed and undergo a cold soak before fermentation with wild yeast, a method pioneered by the late, great Henri Jayer. Cellar operations like pigeages and remontages are gentle and performed with the goal of expressing the nuances of each site. Accordingly, commercial yeasts, bacteria, enzymes and other additives are out of the question, and new oak is used judiciously. With few exceptions, the wines are bottled unfiltered, while sulfur doses are kept to a minimum.
