Domaine Jean-Louis Chave Hermitage Blanc 2021

Domaine Jean-Louis Chave Hermitage Blanc 2021

Chave is the greatest producer in Hermitage. His family has been making wine there since the 1400s. The current proprietor is Jean-Louis, and the Domaines full name is Domaine Jean-Louis Chave, but this is in honor of his grandfather, who bore the same name.

Chave is a true believer in blending, and his red wine is produced from numerous vineyards, though the backbone comes from Bessards. He is not a full-blown traditionalist, preferring to de-stem most of his fruit, fermenting mostly in smaller casks and steel, rather than the traditional open wood casks, and aging his wines in small, Burgundy-sized barrels of 228L (though only a small portion of those barrels are new).

Chave’s Hermitage combine purity with grandeur. They speak clearly and with intensity. Grand vintages age effortlessly; weaker vintages always surprise even 1996s and 2002s, bad vintages both, are shockingly good wines, though for drinking at a younger age to be sure.

Crititcal Acclaim

95 Jeb Dunnuck

Recently bottled, the 2021 Hermitage Blanc is a brilliant wine that shows a fresher, more mineral-driven style while still clearly being in the classic Jean-Louis concentrated, textured style. White currants, crushed citrus, flowers, green almond, and a kiss of reductive-like minerality all define the aromatics, and if you called this a great Grand Cru White Burgundy in a blind tasting, I wouldn’t hold it against you. Medium to full-bodied, concentrated, and beautifully balanced, with a terrific salinity on the finish, it’s going to benefit from a year or two of bottle age and I suspect evolve for 20-25 years.