2013 Celine et Vincent Dureuil Rully 1er Cru Raclot 750 ml

Craftsmanship from Rully’s Rising Star

Vincent Dureuil’s wines are catapulting the Côte Chalonnaise onto the radar of white Burgundy lovers in France and abroad. Their ascension is propelled by his own cachet as a winemaking wunderkind — a reputation he’s been building since he took over his father’s estate in his early twenties. The terroir-driven 2013 Celine et Vincent Dureuil Rully 1er Cru Raclot justifies his status. He’s climbed the top of the mountain for this label in a literal sense — Raclot is one of Rully’s highest altitude vineyards, some seven miles south of Puligny-Montrachet. His delicate, artistic touch assures the clamber was worth every step.

Sourcing from a premier cru vineyard like Raclot dovetails nicely with Dureuil’s usual practice of biodynamically farming his 17-hectare old-vine Rully estate. It also proves he’s not afraid to break a sweat during the vine-to-bottle journey. 2013 presented a few headaches for Burgundy producers — a cold, rainy spring did gave way a warm summer, but freak hailstorms kept everyone on edge. Dureuil was in the vineyard day after day, managing his canopy with the same care as raising a child — a discipline that has paid huge dividends for him, even in nail-biting vintages.

This 2013 Raclot was hand-harvested, whole-cluster pressed and fermented on indigenous yeasts in stainless tanks before aging 12 months in French oak — just 25% new. Its aromatic intensity, energy and richness are simply extraordinary. One sip is all that’s needed to understand why Chardonnay savant Jean-Francois Coche (of Domaine Coche-Dury fame) has said: “If I see his (Dureuil) name on a wine list, I don’t give it a second thought and simply order his wine.”