If you snagged Eric Forest's “village” offering this morning, my hat goes off to you, but now comes the greatest part: His newly elevated, highly buzzed-about Premier Cru bottling. In 2020, France’s wine board upgraded several Pouilly-Fuissé vineyards with long-awaited and long-overdue Premier Cru statuses. While that does mean higher prices, it also means that qualitatively and logically speaking, today’s epic 2022 “Les Crays” bottling can go toe-to-toe with most 1er Crus in Puligny, Chassagne, or Meursault. And it most certainly does. Eric’s wines are unapologetically rich, deep, tension-loaded Burgundies and “Les Crays” is about as “Montrachet” as it gets for less than $100 these days. Big words, I know, but it’s a mighty big wine. We have just a couple cases, so grab some quick, and watch them shatter many triple-digit blockbusters over the next 5-8 years.
A bit more on the Premier Cru elevation: After a decade-long and hard-fought “application” process, France’s National Institute of Origin and Quality (INAO) elevated a handful of vineyards in Pouilly-Fuissé to coveted Premier Cru status in 2020. This is a first for the Mâconnais, and the first time since 1943 that a reclassification of this magnitude was approved.
Eric’s small, seven-hectare estate is located in the aforementioned powerhouse village of Vergisson and many of his vines are family heirlooms, aged between 40-90 years. Understanding that he’s equipped with some of the region’s finest raw material, he farms his parcels with organic and biodynamic principles. Premier Cru “Les Crays” is a steep, south-facing vineyard clinging to the Roche de Vergisson. Forest’s two hectares of vines here were planted between 1930-1966 and they’re farmed and harvested entirely by hand. In the cellar, the grapes ferment in new and used French oak and age 15 months on lees. An unfined and unfiltered bottling occurs via gravity—no pumps!
Forest’s 2022 Premier Cru “Les Crays” is a big, rich, concentrated Chardonnay that floods and intoxicates the sense without apology. The palate drips with ripe apricot and poached pear, followed by candied citrus, baked apple, honeysuckle, churned butter, wet stone, and pie spices. This is for Burgundy’s hedonists, those who want an extra few textural gears without sacrificing tension. It’s incredible right now, and should keep firing at this high level for no less than five years. Enjoy, and please do match it against some $100+ Côte de Beaune bottlings.
