Just bottled when I tasted it, Fournier’s 2008 Marsannay Les Longeroies brimmed with tart cherry and cherry pits, combining underlying beef marrow, and wet stone in a manner that put me in mind a bit of certain top-notch cru Beaujolais. Pungent nips of fresh ginger and lemon zest lend an invigoration that enhances the resemblance of this refreshing Pinot to a white wine. While some are bound to find it too spare, this displays distinctive personality and persistent length, and is likely to have improved after recovering from bottle. I would tentatively envision drinking it over the next 4-5 years. As in 2007, Fournier refrained from attempting a methode ancien “Version Originale” version of Longeroies.
Laurent Fournier’s proclivity for larger barrel sizes – one I generally applaud – and for racking his wines out of them after 14 months, exacerbated the CO2 retention in 2008s that had been late and long in malo. He terminated one early bottling run – in February, much later than normal, and just before my visit – when he realized the wine was too gaseous and unresolved to merit early enjoyment. Additionally, the aggressive acids and delayed malolactic transformation seemed to accentuate the extent to which some of his 2008s took on awkward flavors of oak that might nonetheless integrate with time. For these reasons, I must deliver a somewhat tentative report on wines that in recent years have proven to offer excellent value. Fournier started picking already on September 22, and said the work went quicker than in 2007 when ripeness in his sites was even less regular. (Fournier’s 2009s, incidentally, look to constitute his most impressive collection yet.)
A Thomas Calder Selection (various importers), Paris; fax 011-33-1-46-45-15-29; Also a Cellar Door Selection, Columbia , MD; tel. (410) 309-6063
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