Domaine Larue, Puligny Montrachet, 1er Cru Sous Les Puits 2023

An incredible wine from one of the top 1er Cru sites in this, one of the top white wine-producing villages in the world. The wines of Puligny Montrachet are in soaringly high demand and the sky seems to be the limit in terms of pricing, making this example exceptionally good value for money.

This wine is full of aromatic charm and interest, inviting and then compelling you into the glass for a fabulous array of flavour, texture and length. It really is sensationally fine: minerally textured and vibrantly layered with incredibly complex, tight-knit and delicious flavours. It is at this level that one starts to get to separate the sheep from the goats.

The Larue winery is based to the west of Puligny, in Saint Aubin. From here the four family members (brothers Denis and Didier and their sons, cousins Bruno and Vivien) farm 17 hectares of vines across the Côtes de Beaune, from Chassagne in the south to Aloxe Corton at the north, they are a family who make wines with incredible confidence and precision. 

Interestingly, they only make wines from their own grapes: in Puligny this is vitally important as the most common practice in the Village (though absolutely no one talks about it), is that growers sell their grapes, and often the actual wines themselves,  to other domaines who then simply put their name on the bottle after they aged them. This happens a lot. In a sense it's hardly surprising given the massive demand and static availability of grapes, and the price for wine being higher than the price for unfermented, raw grapes. And it might sound a little immoral for others to take the credit, but in fact there is still work to be done in the winery even after the wines get taken in... a house style can be reflected in length and type of aging, bottling practices and so on. But it does make us look for Domaine-made and bottled wines first...

So, this Puligny is the real deal. Grapes grown here are from vines up to 72 years old in a vineyard that only has 1.8 hectares. Limestone soils and an east-facing exposure help with coolness and aromatic quality. Traditionally made and aged, they are of the more conservative style of the village, but that's not a bad thing, when you're talking about an historic precedent of the best in the world.