Serious question. When did the quality of Trapet increase so much that we are discussing Rousseau vs Trapet?
I had some 88/89 Trapet Chambertin that were not very good at all.
Burg discussions are the best discussions. ![[wow.gif]](/uploads/db3686/original/2X/7/7d450e9830889c8943b674446a21b7254cad657e.gif "wow"){kind=small}
![[rofl.gif]](/uploads/db3686/original/2X/a/a7452fcd8e675af869f8da01174474a545b03944.gif "rofl"){kind=small}
I canāt recall exactly when Jean-Louis took over, but quality jumped in a major way in the late 90s/early 00s and kept improving. Before, there were great wines from time-to-time (I had a killer 59 Clos Prieur from Trapet at 45 years), but no consistency, which was true of many addresses in the era you mention. A lot of top estates became beloved by becoming consistently great first - and providing consistent quality inspired younger generations elsewhere to follow in their footsteps.
(edit to add)
Itās easy to forget that weāre living in a golden age for the region. The wines were all over the map for most of our lifetimes. Consistent quality across producers and appellations is, IMHO, a much more recent development than it might seem.
Still my favorite Burgundy producer just that I canāt afford them anymore. In good old days when I used to get Ruchottes Chambertin for Ā£350 a case during EP, they were my āhouse winesā of choice. 
For years, Ruchottes were vastly underrated by critics.
My take:
1/ french culture: i personally believe that frenchies always try to destroy idols when they go too high. We like stories where challengers overcome true champions + iām not sure french people really like championsā¦
2/ french press knows that its audience is rather made of people buying trapet, damoy or bouchard than rousseau. It is not too complicated to imagine that selling a story where trapet, mortet and perrot minot increasingly close the gap with rousseau makes more impactā¦
Rousseau is neither underrated nor overrated. He is a pretty constant producer of top wines. The problem is the hype. This board is an example. Reading some posts here in this thread one can think Rousseau makes wines in a quality no other producer is able to achieve. Thatās certainly not true and I am pretty sure even Rousseau himself would never state something like that. It would be very interesting to organize a blind tasting with 10 Chambertin/Beze producers and 10 Burgundy lovers from vintages 1993, 1996 and 1999. I would not bet that Rousseau will be the lonely leader. That wouldĀ“t mean Rousseaus wines arenāt wonderful. They are. It would be the proof again that hype is the opposite of objectivity.
BTW. I know Burgundy producers who donāt understand the exaggerations the market produces. Many people at the Domaines are way more down to earth than a good part of their clients.
BTW2. Not that long ago I had a bottle of 2001 Rousseau Clou St. Jacques with a group of experienced wine nerds and it was pretty disappointing. The bottle wasĀ“t corked and was stored in a perfect cellar since release. A recent 2007 Rousseau Rouchottes was very good but certainly not more than that.
Thanks Jim. I have been lurking too long.
I think Larry raises a good point about the understanding we extend to established producers. I think it is right to do so because wines are often opened too young / wrong temp / with the wrong food etc. however it is dangerous.
The track record can also offer reassurance about what kind of experience we can expect. Rousseau delivers a lot of pleasure reliably to a wide audience encompassing many non burg enthusiasts. I note that a number of the best loved producers have a distinct individual style: Rousseau, Coche, Pierre Morey era Leflaive, Raveneau. I donāt question the quality of any of these but I wonder if familiarity makes them even more enjoyable.
Where things have changed recently i.e. Perrot-Minot and Mortet I would be reluctant to try and nail down the style or quality level. I am excited by both, especially Perrot-Minot but i think they are both experimenting and developing.
I donāt know the Trapet wines well enough to have a view.
I think the real value (if one can still say that about Burgundy) lies in producers who have the track record but lie just off the radar. For me, Bruno Clair is the top one here. I would also look to the CĆ“te de Beaune where best in class producers such as Lafarge and Pousse dāOr compare very favourably to typical CĆ“te de Nuits pricing.
We can sum up the whole thread in 1 mathematical function I came up years ago for fun that links quality and price:
Take wine1: its score is S1 and its Price is P1
Take wine2: its score is S2 and its Price is P2
If S2 > S1, then P2 = exp(S2/S1) * P1
So a difference of 1 point in score leads to ratio of 2.7 in price. To that, you still need multiply by the hype factor of the vintage where resellers increase their margins even more. For a vintage like 2015, the hype factor is going to be around 2.5.
So the real formula is
P2 = exp(S2/S1) * P1 * HypeFactor
If other words, it means that price goes up exponentially as score increases (by increment). It is wine critics vs group thinking in numbers, amplified by the vintage hype
Letās see with 2015
Chambertin Trapet is at 97 according to Burghound, Rousseau is at 98
Theoretical price difference should be exp(98/97) = 2.75. But then hype factor is high for 2015 so it is going to be a ratio of 2.75*2.5 = 6.9
On WS, Trapet 2015 is at $400.
There is no Rousseau available for 2015, I would expect Rousseau to be priced at $2760.
It think you get it all wrong here.
First, la Revue Des Vins de France has 0 credit what so ever among French wine enthusiasts. They sell magazines with ads at every other page. Bettane et Desseauve have more but it is limited by some conflict of interests (they organize wine events with producers)
Even more, there is no real Burgundy wine critics in France but at the end it is not really important for French market [people read Burghound if they need details]. The reason is that in France, availability of Burgundy wine is really really limited. Great domains sell 5-10% of their production to allocations (private customers, restaurants) and pretty much the rest goes to export. You really have very limited inventory in wine merchants, and wine merchants will only sell you good bottles if you are a regular. Damoy or Montille export 90% of the production out of France for instance. Good luck finding wine from Montille, Damoy, Morter, Perrot Minot in any shop in France unless you have relations ā¦
I have had much better access to Burgundy wine since I moved to the US than I have ever had before.
Rousseau overrated?
Well - R. makes imho one of the 2 best Chambertin (with Leroy), and probably THE best CdBeze ā¦
ā¦ but there are a good 10-15 other producers from other Appellations that produce wine on the same high level - from Romanee-St.Vivant, Richebourg, Musigny, Clos de la Roche, not to speak of La RomanĆ©e, RC and LT ā¦
The R.Clos St.Jacques is imho indeed a bit overrated (certainly in markt prices) ā¦ as good as it is it cannot compete with some 1er Crus (from other villages) ā¦ it is very fine but a bit marked by wood treatment and not as intense and long in the finish as the price suggests ā¦
I also like the Ruchottes ā¦ but the other GCs are more often than not slightly disapointing ā¦
For fun?
I believe itās now accepted as the secondary market pricing model by all the major auction houses. ![[dance-clap.gif]](/uploads/db3686/original/2X/8/835ce082e2fa9c96c4b7f96406bf6e9a0db882ff.gif "[dance-clap.gif]"){kind=small}
Not sure to follow you on thisā¦
Having relations is a basic if you want to grab 1 bottle out of the [500] produced annually.
Burgundy is not like bordeaux where you buy whatever you want at rather the same price across shops.
I dont know the price of a bottle of chambertin rousseau in the us but I would bet this is greater than >1000$.
So being surprised by availability when you pay the market price reminds me the fable āmonsieur Jourdainā ā¦
Well Rousseau is hard to find everywhere.
Try to find wine in the US and in France, so you will be surprised how difficult it is to find what you want in France.
I find whatever i want in Franceā¦
This is just a matter of efforts ans patience
You are making my point. In the US you donāt need effort and patience.
Youāre making my point as well: ālazinessā has its price: the market price
???
French wine retailers have less inventory of Burgundy wine than US wine retailers for all best domains. That is a fact. Most good burgundy wine bottles go to export. Only a fraction of French wine buyers can benefit from allocations.
In top of that, pretty much all wine merchants in the US are fair: they provide the inventory and you can purchase those bottles. It is not the case in France. There are many bottles that are hidden and reserved for good customers and friends.
There is no ālazinessā or price āconsiderationā here. If you claim that you can get any wine you like at good price in France, good for you. You are smarter than a lot of people and I guess you know people to give you access to what you want.
Anyone can just play with wine-searcher (for US market) or wine decider (more used in French market) or google and you will see it the difference. There are much more choice, refences, vintages available in the US.
Then if you play the auction game, you can have access to everything at basically the same price on both ends of the Atlantic ocean.
Hereās another POV re: why Rousseau is āunderratedā, not overrated. (Of course, any āratedā begs the question of what one meansā¦top wines are top; accross the stable, etc.?)
I visited Rousseau reguarly from 1990-2007ā¦and bought wines from them almost every year in between. (A big hunk of my cellar). But, I donāt look at the quality of a domaine as being determined by the quality of its top wines only, but by its whole stable. And, there isnāt a better stable in all of Burgundyā¦except for DRC, I guess. And, I always wanted and was impressed more with the ālesser grands crusā there: Ruchottes, Clos de la Roche and particularly, Mazy-Chambertin which, IMO, are wonderful wines year after year, and as Greg pointed out, show well at every stage [after ten years outā¦] The values on them are extraordinary, IMO. They are not as flashy as their big 3 mainly because of the limited/no use of NFO on their elevages. Treat Mazy like Charles Rousseau [over]treated the CSJ and over-esteemed it vis a vis other grand crus thereā¦and their Mazy would be legendary. Ditto for their Ruchottes, which does get some. (And their Clos de la Roche has some potential, too.)
Take the estate as a wholeā¦itās as āgoodā and as any estate making red wine in Burgundy (except DRC, which Iāve never bought or really experienced). But, nobody focuses on the real āhiddenā treasures thereā¦when evaluating it. Only the big 3. Put them all together and they spellā¦āmagicā. (And, for me, they made the best '95s Iāve tasted.)
Really good winemakingā¦although filtered pretty well, and, therefore, polished (for a particular reason)ā¦and GREAT holdingsā¦and plenty of resources to do it right. An invulnerable combo, IMO.
The big 3 are the tip of the iceberg, albeit a golden tip. Andā¦the two Chambertins are , IMO, as good as any red grand cru Iāve ever experienced.
Underrated, from hereā¦and so much potentialā¦if they shared some NFO on the ālesserā winesā¦
Now, the cost is a separate thingā¦
I donāt know what it is like in France, but over many years I have searched out Rousseau in the US. Unless you are fortunate enough to know a retailer willing to sell you one of his maybe 2-3 bottles of Chambertin at regular retail (currently about ?$650 or so per bottle)ā¦that is, if he has not decided to sell his allocation at auction for a tidy profitā¦then you can easily find them online for $1,500+, since most retailers mark them up considerably. The days of finding Rousseau in the US at regular retail as long as you are willing to invest the āefforts and patienceā are IMO long gone. Finding them at an egregious 2-3 (or more) times regular retail requires little effort and scant patience but a deep pocketbook.
Robertā¦
Have you ever looked for anything ālowerā than the Chambertins/big 3??
Disturbingly, it seems many people ārateā Rousseau on this/these wines only. The other stuff is the real value, IMO. But, I have no idea whether itās easier to find them in the markets.The Chambertins are, like the top DRC winesā¦smallish production and huge demand, so one would expect what youāve described. Trophies.