2012 Burgundy Vintage

2012 was a rather disjointed weather year. Winter was mild, broken only by a cold spell in February, and it ended mild enough to set the vines up for a quick start; March was springlike. April turned cooler and wetter, with some morning frosts that affected the vineyard. Cool, damp weather at flowering brought coulure and millerandage, rain and hail did serious damage, and the head start seen at bud break was lost. June was cooler and rainy, and the summer that followed was unstable, with a heatwave, hail and storms. Frost, hail, poor flowering, mildew, oidium, bouts of excess rain and sunburn from the heat all took a toll, and some growers sprayed from backpacks because machines could not get into the muddy rows. The worst of the hail fell on the Cote de Beaune, particularly its centre and south, and some parcels in Pommard and neighbouring communes lost up to 80 percent of their crop, while the hill of Corton, the Cote Chalonnaise and the Cote de Nuits escaped the hail. Then the weather turned. The second half of July and August were just about perfect for ripening, and August in particular was fine, hot and dry. Harvest began in mid-September with the fruit in perfect health. The crop was down 30 percent in the Cote de Nuits and 50 percent in the Cote de Beaune, and even more in some vineyards.

Yields were very low but not consistently so: some parcels came close to a normal crop while neighbouring vines gave nothing, and the Cote de Nuits suffered less than the Cote de Beaune. Red yields were about 40 percent down on average, with some Cote de Beaune vineyards below 10 hl/ha and the Cote de Nuits generally better placed to reach 30 hl/ha or more. Meursault suffered, with most of its best-known domaines harvesting near 20 hl/ha, and Jean-Marc Roulot had 50 percent less volume and chose not to harvest 45 small parcels. The Camus grapes in Charmes-Chambertin were almost wiped out. Away from the Cote d'Or, coulure and millerandage trimmed volumes in the earliest Chablis sectors and in the Maconnais, where ripening was sometimes delayed, while the Cote Chalonnaise avoided the hail and saw less bad weather than its neighbours.

• Cote de Nuits: escaped the hail but not coulure and millerandage; crop down 30 percent
• Cote de Beaune: hail hit hardest in its centre and south; crop down 50 percent, and leading Meursault domaines picked near 20 hl/ha
• Corton hill and the Cote Chalonnaise: spared by the storms
• Chablis and the Maconnais: coulure and millerandage limited volumes, but the BIVB rated quality highly

Meursault grower Jean-Marc Roulot told Wine Spectator, "This is my 24th harvest and I think it was the most difficult." Conventional, organic or biodynamic, farming method gave vignerons no advantage, and biodynamic growers were made to suffer in particular, though not only them. The small crop helped in the end. Natural thinning from frost, poor flowering, mildew and the removal of sunburned berries left ripe grapes on the vine, and Aubert de Villaine of Domaine de la Romanee-Conti told Wine Spectator, "This was the factor that favored quality." Timing varied. Some Cote de Nuits domaines and the great white villages of the Cote de Beaune had everything in by Friday 21st, ahead of forecast rain, while a smaller group had not started by Friday 28th, the day Clos de Tart began. Cote de Beaune whites often needed sorting to remove some botrytis and hail-split, dried grapes, but Burgundy-Report found the red grapes very clean, with much better maturity than 2011. Many 2011s were chaptalised, and chaptalisation was not expected to be really needed in 2012.

The BIVB summed up the vintage as small quantities but fine quality. In the Cote de Nuits it called 2012 an excellent vintage, with deep colour, aromas of small fruit and ripe berries, supple, fresh wines and particularly tender tannins, built for long ageing. Cote de Beaune reds gained from a concentration effect and were fruity and spicy, with fresh acidity and very good ageing potential. Among the whites, the BIVB singled out the hill of Corton for powerful, fresh wines, and praised the Cote Chalonnaise, the Maconnais and Chablis, where later parcels gave citrus notes and a straight, mineral palate. Its vintage page describes the reds as black-fruited, spicy and marked by forest floor, and calls 2012 without question a very fine year for ageing. Wine Spectator's report judged quality very good in the Cote de Beaune to outstanding in the Cote de Nuits, with no botrytis problems, and Louis Jadot winemaker Frederic Barnier said, "The reds are really consistent, [with] good color, good concentration."

• Cote de Nuits: deep colour, ripe small fruit and particularly tender tannins, built for long ageing
• Cote de Beaune reds: fruity and spicy with fresh acidity, helped by a concentration effect
• Whites: rich, varied aromatics and impressive length; later Chablis parcels show citrus and a mineral line
• Wine Spectator's read: very good in the Cote de Beaune to outstanding in the Cote de Nuits