Domaine Hubert Lamy Puligny-Montrachet Les Tremblots Vieilles Vignes, 2019, 75cl

Mingling aromas of pear and mandarin with hints of buttered toast and hazelnuts, Lamy's 2019 Puligny-Montrachet Les Tremblots is medium to full-bodied, layered and concentrated, with tangy acids and a tightly wound, incisive profile. Concluding with a saline finish, this is well worth seeking out. Sometimes I contemplate what I think might be the easiest way to make enemies in Burgundy: A Michelin Guide-style ranking, out of three stars, of the region's best domaines. Olivier Lamy would be one of three white wine producers in the Côte de Beaune to whom I would unquestionably award three stars. Last year, I wrote that I ran the risk of exhausting superlatives if I attempt to articulate just how much I admire these wines, and this year is no different. In 2019, yields were reduced by frost, averaging around 25 hectoliters per hectare, yet the wines aren't defined by it as they were, for example, in 2016, when an abundance of second- and third-generation grapes complicated the choice of harvest date. Concentrated and textural, with prodigious levels of dry extract, they will demand more patience than his superb 2018s, yet in the end I suspect they will prove even finer wines. As ever, given Lamy's cold cellars and his winemaking approach, the wines evolve slowly; this is far from the easiest tasting of my three months of visits, and I confess to succumbing to the venal sin of smugness at having left the afternoon empty when I witnessed two fellow critics arrive for our shared appointment fresh from six of seven preceding tastings. Attention to what is going on chez Lamy is liberally repaid, however, and behind the suspended lees and the reduction and (more rarely) the oak, it is apparent that this is a very special vintage in the making. Long after the sun set over the Côte d'Or, we continued tasting, looking at bottled 2017s and 2018s, wines that confirmed all the promise they showed during their élevage.