We held our long-awaited 2011 Maison Ilan tasting tonight. I will post more notes later but I want to get the thread up so others can comment. I will post the full statistics after I get them from Scott.
Thanks very much to Andrew and Chiara for hosting and for the great fondue! Thanks to all for sharing your wines.
We had all eight MI 2011s and split them into two flights. First flight had all the non-Gevrey wines plus two ringers. Second flight had all the Gevreys plus two ringers. All ringers were 2011s. Wines were quickly double-decanted and served single blind. The first set was served roughly 30 minutes after the decant and the second flight about 90 minutes after. The ringers were identified by village only, though some people knew their exact identities. We tasted, ranked and guessed identities prior to revealing the wines in each flight.
Flight 1 results:
1st place, 20 points: 2011 Maison Ilan MSD Chaffots
2nd place, 25 points: 2011 Le Grappin Savigny Les Beaune
3rd place, 26 points: 2011 Maison Ilan MSD Mont Luisants
4th place, 28 points: 2011 Maison Ilan Volnay Robardelles
5th place, 30 points: 2011 Odoul Coquard MSD Clos La Riotte
6th place, 39 points: 2011 Maison Ilan Chambolle Feusselottes
In this flight, I think most people felt there were five pretty good but not really exciting wines, fairly consistent with other 2011s we’ve had. Some of us felt the Chambolle was flawed as it was cloudy and had some strange aspects to its nose, though all agreed it was drinkable. Some wines changed quite a bit throughout the tasting. Several of us felt that the Mont Luisants was coming on very strong though we didn’t have it ranked first. It is light in color and body but has a very nice nose and elegance. Obviously the Le Grappin was well received and the clear value in the tasting.
Flight 2 results:
1st place, 21 points: 2011 Pacalet Lavaux St. Jacques
2nd place, 28 points: 2011 Maison Ilan Mazoyeres Chambertin
3rd place, 29 points: 2011 Maison Ilan Le Chambertin
4th place, 30 points: 2011 Maison Ilan Gevrey Chambertin Les Corbeaux
5th place, 32 points: 2011 Chevillon Pruliers
6th place, 32 points: 2011 Maison Ilan Charmes Chambertin
This flight was pretty uniform. I believe everyone thought all the wines were quite good and most felt the quality was higher in this flight than the first. The Pacalet was strikingly different than the others in its nose and structure, and several people ranked it first. Almost all had it ranked near the top (I ranked it last because its different characteristics didn’t appeal to me as much, but I still liked it). There is a lot of family resemblance between the Maison Ilan Gevrey-based wines. The Charmes was somewhat reduced at the beginning and that may have led some to downgrade it. I actually thought it was pretty good and quite similar to the Mazoyeres, and the Chambertin for that matter. My favorite was the Chevillon which isn’t that surprising to me (though I didn’t identify any of these wines correctly after calling almost all in the first flight).
Of all these wines I think the most distinctive is the Mont Luisants. I wouldn’t claim it’s the best, but for people who like their Burgundy light, airy and aromatic, it is worth a try. The 2010 was that way when I had it from barrel as well.