2013 Domaine Jean Pierre Seve Pouilly-Fuisse Terroir 750 ml

2013 Jean-Michel Seve Pouilly Fuisse “Terroir” — “Apple, beeswax and honeysuckle”

Just beneath the white crags of La Roche de Solutre, limestone hillsides have long turned out wildly mineral Chardonnay, the best of which outpoints village Meursault.  But over the course of the last twenty years, as growers chased ratings, many Pouilly Fuisse makers inexplicably transitioned towards “modernism,” replacing apple, beeswax and honeysuckle for pineapple and pina colada.

To our taste, only in the coolest vintages was the new approach successful,vintages where tropical fruit weightiness gave way to ripe citrus tension.  But when the growing season was punctuated by a heat spike or two, the Chardonnays lost their nerve and modernism failed.

Never was the distinction between the old school and the new more  evident than in the 2013 vintage, in the fastidious hands of Jean-Pierre Seve, and his aptly named Pouilly Fuisse“Terroir.”  

The winter of 2013 was cold and damp, but after some unusually warm days in March, the vines seemed poised for a fast start. “We thought we were in good shape until early April,” Jean-Pierre told us on his Solutre patio. “But then the spring turned really cold and very wet. The set was small and uneven. By the time July rolled around, we were two full weeks behind.”

If you ever wanted to know why there’s so much premature hair loss in Burgundy, you only had to step into the vigneron’s boots in the summer of 2013. From the beginning of July to the end of August, draught conditions prevailed.  There was barely a drop of rain for the better part of 60 days.. “Had we not had some rain in September,  the vines would have suffered from dehydration. But after the showers, it was smooth sailing. While some (the modernists) waited to pick until mid-October,we started picking at the end of September, and all the Pouilly Fuisse was harvested before the rain began in October.  It was a tiny harvest, but an excellent one.  Clusters were small with quite a bit of millerandages (sweet, seedless shot berries). Acids were excellent.”

The 2013 Domaine Jean-Michel Seve Pouilly Fuisse “Terroir” is an absolute knockout, one of the finest to come off this superb estate in the new millennium.   Pale green-gold to the rim.  Piercing aromas of apple and pear, tinged with mouthwatering minerality.  Rich and opulent on the attack, filled with juicy apple, beeswax and honeysuckle, finely delineated and energetic, finishing with the exquisite acid backbone so common to all of Seve’s Chardonnays.  Delicious out of the gate, don’t be afraid to lay down this marvelous 2013 until sometime in 2020. Like all of Seves Pouilly Fuisses, this one’s built for the long haul.

$38 on release.  Just $21 — as inexpensive as top-notch Roche du Solutre Pouilly Fuisse ever gets — on today’s WineAccess Direct Import.  480 bottles are up for grabs.