93 David Schildknecht - Robert Parker's Wine Advocate

"Deux Montille's 2007 Puligny-Montrachet Champs-Gain – from a six barrel-sized parcel of old vines where they are able to call the shots in terms of viticulture and harvest – smells of narcissus, fresh peach, quince, musk melon, and hint of wood smoke. This comes to the palate richly textured, its ripe fruit, bright citricity, and persistent florality underlain by saline, stony suggestions that emerge to prominence in a positively gripping finish that is vibratory in its sense of energy and reverberates like an organ chord through the full range of floral, fruit, and mineral registers, each delineated with striking clarity. The quince and honey aspects of this wine – when taken with its smoky and strikingly mineral cast – put one slightly in mind of a great Loire Chenin. This apotheosis of high-altitude 2007 white Burgundy should be worth following for the better part of a decade. In the course of its six years, this negociant business of siblings has mourned the loss of a few excellent contracts, but continues to be an expanding source of impeccably rendered, consistently nuanced (and almost exclusively white) Burgundies. Alix de Montille puts special emphasis on ferreting out excellent sites in the less fashionable villages of the Cote d'Or, as well as in the Cote Chalonnaise. The resulting wines are expensive relative to their appellations but not to their quality. (For more about Alix de Montille's approach – avowedly influenced by that of her husband, Jean-Marc Roulot – readers are urged to consult my report in issue 180.)"