2020 Guilhem & J-Hugues Goisot Irancy Les Mazelots, Burgundy

Dark crimson purple. A very Irancy nose with that touch of dry graphite which I frequently find. All Pinot, no César, from vines more than 100 years old. Needs 5 years to lose the mineral graphite to let the fruit and flowers evolve, I suspect. Tense, tight, mineral, red blood character, fresh plums. Tannins without being rustic.

90 points Jasper Morris MW insideburgundy.com

Biodynamic. Single vineyard Pinot Noir from 100-year-old vines. Irancy is a small hamlet with just over 300 inhabitants, situated roughly equidistant between Auxerre and Chablis. The village lies two kilometres from the Yonne River and is surrounded by a large natural amphitheatre of vines. It is one of the most northerly AOCs in France to grow red grapes, and like the neighbouring wine villages of Chitry and Saint-Bris, the wines of Irancy only make rare appearances on the export market. The vineyards, interspersed with cherry orchards, are planted on slopes of Kimmeridgian limestone mixed with red clays. These highly mineral soils and the extreme northern location help to give these Pinots incredible energy, brightness and a tangy, chiselled minerality.
 
Goisot has a paltry 0.5 hectares in the lieu-dit of Les Mazelots, and his viticulture and vine age are now delivering serious depth and flesh. In the context of Irancy, this wine is a superstar. These are some of the oldest Pinot vines in France and produce outstanding, super-mineral, savoury wines with irresistible energy. In the past, these could be big chewy wines that were hard to approach young, but Guilhem Goisot has brought more plushness and seduction in recent years as he has learned to tame the tannins and intense minerality of this terroir.