A Splendid Septet of Wines

Raymond Blake tastes seven vintages of the Burgundy premier cru, Gevrey-Chambertin ‘Aux Combottes’, from Domaine Dujac, owned by the Seysses family

Saturday 2nd March 2024. A group of like-minded Burgundy lovers (for which read fanatics) gather in Dublin, Ireland for a tasting hosted by one of their number. He calls it a ‘final bottle’ tasting – in other words, when he gets down to his last bottle of several different wines he assembles them for a themed tasting with friends. Previously, an array of Australian wines from Penfolds was put under the microscope, this time the focus was tighter: seven vintages of a highly-regarded Burgundy premier cru – Gevrey-Chambertin ‘Aux Combottes’ – all from the same producer – Domaine Dujac.

In the centuries-long history of Burgundy, Domaine Dujac is a relative newcomer, having been founded by Jacques Seysses in 1968. The name ‘Dujac’ is a pun on his first name and means ‘the domaine of Jacques’, chosen because, he once told me, nobody could spell his surname correctly. Depending on how you look at it, his timing was terrible or excellent, for the 1968 vintage was infamously bad and prompted him to conclude that things could never get worse. Nor did they. Indeed, the trajectory since that atrocious year has been steadily upward, to the point where Dujac is now regarded as one of the finest Burgundy domaines of them all.

There is a strong American influence at the domaine, for Jacque’s wife, Rosalind, is from California and their son Jeremy is married to Diana, who is also from California and is a winemaker in her own right. Together with Jeremy’s brother, Alex, this trio are now in charge of all the day-to-day operations at the domaine. The vineyard holdings comprise a choice roster, including several grands crus — the flagship being almost two hectares of Clos de la Roche. But just slightly down the pecking order can be found celebrated premiers crus such as the Vosne-Romanée pair, Malconsorts and Beaumonts, as well as Aux Combottes in Gevrey-Chambertin.

I always think of Aux Combottes and Vosne-Romanée’s Les Suchots as a pair, not because of any stylistic similarity but because a glance at the map shows each to be surrounded by famed grands crus vineyards, prompting the question: why not this pair? Why are they ‘only’ premiers crus? In each case the answer is the same; both vineyards lie in a slight declivity compared to their patrician neighbours, meaning the terroir is not quite so favoured as the contiguous vineyards.

In Combottes’ case a more colourful theory is that when the classification was being made all the owners of Combottes came from Morey-Saint-Denis, even though the vineyard lies in the Gevrey-Chambertin commune, hence nobody from Gevrey was interested in pleading its case for designation as grand cru. There is little evidence to support this assertion but like all good stories one should not let the facts spoil it.

Aux Combottes lies at the southern extreme of Gevrey-Chambertin and its neighbours are: to the north, Latricières-Chambertin; to the east, Mazoyères-Chambertin; to the south, Clos de la Roche; and to the west, the Monts Luisants lieu-dit of Clos de la Roche. It keeps the best of company. In area the vineyard stretches to a little over 4.5 hectares and Domaine Dujac are the largest landowners with 1.16 hectares, a holding that is considerably larger than any other and positively dwarfs the 0.15 held by Domaine Rossignol-Trapet for instance.

In the words of noted Burgundy authority, Jasper Morris: “Combottes can make exceptionally fine wine which, in the hands of Domaine Dujac, is of greater interest than many second-rate wines from Charmes- Chambertin or Chapelle-Chambertin. Indeed, chez Dujac the Combottes is priced very little below its own Charmes- Chambertin.”

My own general assessment, gleaned over the years, would concur with this, for I have always found Combottes to be fine rather than full, no doubt thanks to its proximity to Morey-Saint-Denis. I have never thought of it as an exemplar of what I call the ‘meat and muscle’ style of classic Gevrey-Chambertin; for that you need to be in the heart of the commune.

The stars of this tasting for me were the 2002 and the 2009, with the 1994 and the 2001 as surprising delights. Perhaps the clearest lesson when approaching a tasting such as this is to leave all preconceptions behind and assess each wine on its merits, there and then. Were the tasting to have been repeated a week later, for example, it is more than likely that opinions and preferences would have changed. That is the joy of wine and, most particularly, Burgundy.