Dom. Jean Grivot
Echezeaux Grand Cru
Vosne-Romanee
2009

The producer

Jean Grivot was a giant of Burgundian winemakers making outstanding wines when much of the region fell prey to spoilage and lack of care despite demanding high prices. His example led many others to lift their game. Son Etienne and his wife Marielle took over in 1987 and continued the exemplary work producing top class Burgundies from vineyards around Vosne-Romanee.

The estate comprises 15.5ha including slices of Richebourg, Echezeaux and Clos de Vougeot now run by their daughter Mathilde since 2017. Other Premier Cru vineyards include the Grand Cru challenging Les Beaux Monts and Suchots in Vosne-Romanee and Aux Boudots (among others) in Nuits Saint Georges.

Mathilde farms organically without certification with the belief that healthy, ripe fruit makes the best wines. Attention to detail in vineyard and winery with the aim of clear expression of terroir result in some of the finest wines, especially from Vosne-Romanee.

The wine

Jean Grivot is, with 0.85 hectares, the largest landowner in the Les Cruots lieu dit of the Echezeaux Grand Cru. Cruots is inarguably one of the finest parts of the Grand Cru with soil rich in chalk and lots of small stones in the upper layers. The fruit is entirely destemmed, and ageing takes place in up to 40% new oak barrels for around 14-18 months. The wines from here are delicate and subtle with incredibly pure fragrance and dense black fruit concentration – easily some of the finest in the appellation.

We choose our wines based on a range of criteria (see how we choose our wines) of which critic scores is just one. Rather than simply highlight the best score to promote a wine, our average critic score is calculated from the scores provided by several respected wine critics, who we follow for specific regions. They do not represent all critic scores and, wherever possible, we try and give more weight to more recent reviews. Where appropriate we consider market-based scores like Global Wine Score or Wine Searcher Average scores.

As a rule, we look to offer wines that achieve a 92/100 average critic score or better and frankly a lot of very good wines simply don’t make the cut. As a high-end provider we want to reflect that positioning in the quality of wines we offer. Such wines are only a tiny fraction of those generally on offer in the market. We believe that an average score is a more conservative and representative approach, but it is still subjective and only offered as a guide to our customers, who will (and should) do their own research. We will add individual critic scores to our website in the future.