This Grand Cru, is the fourth releases from a métayage agreement (whereby the owner gets half of the wine produced) that Mortet has managed to secure with the help of an investor or two. Both are old-vine parcels, and the Mazis has been worked biodynamically for a number of years. The size of the parcel is a tiny fifth of a hectare, with 50-year-old vines in Mazis Haut, on the other side of Pierre Damoy’s Clos-de-Bèze. Mortet now does all the vineyard work, and each year the quality soars anew. The ’17 is very, very smart, as the notes below indicate.
The 2017 Mazis-Chambertin Grand Cru includes 30 to 40% whole bunch fruit and matures in 70% new oak. This debuted in 2014. Arnaud Mortet told me that he feels has finally understood this vineyard. It has a compelling, vivacious, mineral-laden bouquet, driven by blackberry and cranberry fruit, one of the "stoniest" bouquets from Mortet this year. The palate is medium-bodied with crisp tannin, quite tensile and coiled up at the moment, yet there is a very long tail on the finish. This is a supremely detailed offering from Mortet and it should age in accomplished style.”
94-96 points, Neal Martin, Vinous
“2017 Mazis-Chambertin Grand Cru is the fourth vintage of this grand cru that Arnaud Mortet has produced and it's a lovely wine, offering up notes of dark wild berries, orange rind, peonies and spices. On the palate, it's full-bodied, ample and layered, with excellent depth and dimension, framed by fine-grained tannins that assert themselves on the elegantly chalky finish. Mortet manually destemmed a quarter of this cuvée, cutting out the stems and retaining the pedicels.”
93-95 points, William Kelley, The Wine Advocate
“Intensely sauvage and earth-inflected aromas of red currant and spice nuances still manage to retain a certain elegance. There is both good volume and power to the even more mineral-driven larger-scaled flavors that deliver even better depth and persistence on the well-balanced finale. This is not a massively-scaled Mazis but I like the sense of harmony and how well-proportioned it is.”
90-93 points, Allen Meadows, Burghound