I recently picked this 1999 Domaine Jomain BM up; the risk of premox in this era of white Burgundies playing high in my mind, but the frankly amazing price was worth the risk.
Upon opening, the dark colour was definitely a red flag. On the nose, slightly tired notes of yellow apple, white peach, honey, and caramel came out the glass. The palate was as the nose, with further notes of spicy oak, coffee, and walnuts. This nuttiness protruded slightly too much, throwing the wine out of balance. Another red flag. It hadn't fully gone into those nightmare premoxed sherry notes, and there was still good acidity, but I was definitely dismayed.
A fully developed wine that was mature and oxidative. It appeared past its best and was pleasant but a bit too oxidative; a shame but worth the price of admission. There were the makings of a very good wine in there with the structure and acidity, but just felt that it was too oxidised. I went to bed and held out hope that the overnight slow-ox might at least bring out some development.
My hopes were more than exceeded. The next day this wine was a completely different beast; the tired yellow apple had woken up into fresh red apples, with floral jasmine and white peach in the background. It had come into beautiful balance, and oyster shell minerality was singing through now. The nuttiness was of course still there, but had taken a supporting role adding great complexity. The wine had physically lightened in colour, become utterly gorgeous and was fully deserving of its Grand Cru status.
This transformation got me wondering; how many white burgs from the mid/late 90s were wrongly thrown down the sink on that first night, wrongly labelled as premoxed, never to be given the chance to wake up and show their true quality? I have never known a wine to improve as much as this with air; I'm not really one for scoring wines, but this would have upped its score by well over 10 points overnight, and to give a ballpark figure was scoring into the mid-90s.
A real rollercoaster of an experience, and an invaluable lesson for me going forward.
by Twelve_Steaks
Dining and Cooking