Lafon's Santenots is one of the great wines of Volnay.
The wine competes with top examples from d'Angerville and Lafarge.
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Lafon's whites get so much attention, especially his rare Montrachet, that his work in Volnay is, sadly, overlooked.
His Santenots is a muscular expression of Volnay. Santenots is a richer site with clay soils and hard rock underneath. For all of its texture and richness, the magic here is the transparency. Lafon's Santenots always has a ridiculous clarity, as if both soil and stone were pulverized into the wine itself.
As Burghound notes, the 2015 rivals the great examples of the wine. In this vintage, Santenots has serious power and is utterly pristine in its expression. There's a stony core that's sheathed in a velvety and spice-inflected layer of fruit.
My full initiation into the magic of Lafon's Santenots was a bottle of 1978 seven years ago. It was a brilliant bottle. While Lafon's Santenots remains very much an insider's wine, there's a small group that chases the wine aggressively. How quickly our offers sell out makes that very clear. I recommend getting your order in early.
To order, email offers@crushwineco.com or call the store at (212) 980-9463.
Ian McFadden
Director, Fine & Rare
Crush Wine & Spirits
Burghound: "This is also brilliantly spicy with its ultra-pure and pretty essence of black raspberry, floral and warm-earth suffused aromas. Like the Champans there is excellent underlying tension supporting the broad-shouldered flavors that are even more mineral-driven on the muscular, taut and driving finish. This wine always ages well and typically needs quite a bit of it and this terrific effort will be no exception. This could well rival the 1999, 2005 and 2010 versions in time."