2015 Domaine Fabien Coche Bourgogne Chardonnay 750 ml

Meursault-Grown White Burgundy Discovery

Last May, we were out to dinner in the West Village with a long-time client whose generous appetite and aristocratic tastes have often strained our travel-and-expense budget to the point of breaking. His weakness was for Meursault, and as we scanned the wine list, we girded ourselves for a bank-breaking selection: a 2015 Pierre Boisson ($150), or perhaps the 2014 Antonin Guyon ($170). So it was with surprise that we saw our friend wink knowingly at us and proceed to order the 2015 Domaine Fabien Coche Bourgogne—a bottle listed at a fraction of the cost of the Meursaults. Our friend pointed out that Alain Coche produced it—a cousin of Jean-Francois Coche, behind the cult Domaine Coche-Dury estate. And talk about a stunner. We found a chiseled white Burgundy, packed with a mouthwatering mix of ripe orchard fruits, flinty minerality, and white florals tinged with sweet spices. This golden-hued, ultra-refined release is sourced predominantly from Meursault-grown grapes. At $35 a bottle, snag as much as you can from our 36-case allocation.

Burgundy’s 2015 vintage has widely been hailed as exceptional. Jancis Robinson refers to those “whispering comparisons to the outstanding 2005 vintage.” Fortunately for collectors,  what’s good for the Grand Crus—whose prices are especially exorbitant in such a low-yielding year—is good for all of the region. Vinous wrote that “2015 is a great year for village wines.” “The very warm, dry growing season of 2015 yielded Burgundy’s fleshiest, most opulent white wines since at least 2009,” Vinous added. “The 2015 whites are clean, pure and rich.”

Among white Burgundy’s finest bargains is this Domaine Fabien Coche, which hails from a third-generation estate founded in 1940 by Julien Coche in Meursault. His son Alain—cousin of Jean-Francois Coche, behind the cult Domaine Coche-Dury estate—succeeded Julien, expanding the original 3-acre vineyard holdings and garnering rave renown throughout the 1980s and 90s for his Premier Cru Puligny-Montrachets and Batard-Montrachet Grand Cru.

Fabien Coche took up the family business beginning in 1995, and the estate has gone from strength to strength ever since. Today over 60 percent of the vines are over 60 years of age, benefiting from a mixture of limestone and clay soils which lend this golden beauty its mineral complexity.

Sourced predominantly from Meursault, the 2015 Chardonnay contains fruit harvested from eight prime parcels at the bottom of a hill including Sous La Velle, Les Millerands, and Les Herbeaux. A tip of the hat to our friend for clueing us in to one of the most irresistible white Bourgogne values of the year.