2010 Domaine des Comtes Lafon Meursault Perrières 1er Cru

BY ANTONIO GALLONI | AUGUST 31, 2020

Many of my most unforgettable moments in wine involve tasting fine, aged white Burgundy. There is just nothing like the thrill a perfectly stored bottle can deliver after 20, 30 or more years. Unfortunately, these moments have become few and far between. Prices have skyrocketed in recent years, while the scourge of premature oxidations has, understandably, made consumers wary of buying expensive wines for long-term cellaring that might oxidize before ever truly peaking, as wines from previous generations did. I certainly feel that way when it comes to the few white Burgundies I buy. 

I have always loved 2010 in Burgundy. It is a vintage I covered while at The Wine Advocate, so I had a chance to taste many wines from barrel and then from bottle. It’s amazing to think how much things have changed over the last decade. Back then it was possible to taste two vintages (the vintage in barrel and the bottled wines) at pretty much every domaine. Today, that is logistically impossible, as the number of high-quality producers who merit a visit has exploded, which in turn requires tasters to focus on a single vintage at a time to be timely, especially with reviews of barrel samples. 

Lafon’s 2010 Meursault Perrières 1er Cru is simply breathtaking, the sort of wine we all dream of when we put a few bottles away in the cellar. I bought the 2010s on release in Burgundy and have tasted them together only once since then, when a friend opened the Goutte d’Or, Charmes, Perrières and Genevrières about five years ago.  The wines were spectacular on that night. The 2010 Charmes was fabulous last fall, so I had high hopes.

Upon first opening, the 2010 is very tight. The color is perfect, though. Two thousand ten is a vintage with lower-than-average yields, but relatively high levels of both ripeness and acidity. There is obviously a lot of wine here. I have never been a huge fan of decanting reds, except to remove sediment, but as I have gotten older, my preference is to nearly always decant whites. Time in the decanter releases a whole range of Perrières signatures – lemon confit, orchard fruit, mint, white pepper, flowers and a hint of reduction – all gently softened by the slow passage of time. More than anything else, though, I love the wine’s energy and tension. This is classic Perrières.

There were a lot of wines on the table, so we did not finish the 2010. I poured the rest of the wine back in the bottle and tasted it the next day. There was no degradation at all of color (as the photo above attests), while the wine itself was even better. More aromatic, more vibrant, more finely cut and more Perrières.

This is why we buy and cellar wines...for moments like these. Readers who own well-stored bottles of the 2010 are in for a spectacular drinking experience. I can’t wait to taste the 2010 again in another few years’ time. Bravo! 96/Drink 2020-2030.