Clos de Mez
- Among the Most Age-Worthy Wines in Beaujolais
- I Had the 2011 Morgon Recently and It Was Magic
- Like Great Cote-Rotie
- Most of Them Need Time
- Beaujolais Made like Burgundy
- But Marie-Elodie Needed A Wine To Drink Young While The Big Boys Age
Enter Fleurie Mademoiselle M
- From Low Yielding Gamay Vines
- Nose: Stunning and Fresh with Brambly Berries
- Incense, Candied Flowers
- Stunningly Pure and Deep
- Palate: Sweet Dark Cherries, Dark Fruit, Flowers and Spice
- Very Classic Drinkable Beaujolais...
- ...but with the Family DNA of Complexity, Structure and So Darned Well Made
- 91 Points Vinous
If there is one thing about the long lived Beaujolais of Clos de Mez it is that they are a struggle to drink young. For example of all the vintages I have sold, the 2011s are the ones that are drinking the best right now. I mean drinking out of their minds and as good as anything in Beaujolais and priced in the low $20s. 12/13/14/15 all need many years to be that insane liquidy velvet that these wines can get to. In 2015, a new wine was born that captures the freshness, aromatics and vivacity of Gamay and is done with a semi-carbonic maceration and aging in vats for up to 9 months which makes it accessible young. This is a big deal for this estate that they have a wine one can drink with abandon young.
The debut vintage of a new brilliant wine at Clos du Mez is here, the 2015 Fleurie Mademoiselle M for $23.99 a bottle on a 4-pack. Marie-Elodie refers to this wine is the silly little sister of La Dot and Chateau Gaillard. It is from low yielding Gamay vines in the famous pink granite of Fleurie.
The nose is that old familiar Gamay you know and love. It's stunning and fresh with brambly berries that can be red at once but also have a very dark berry character that also runs through the La Dot and the Chateau Gaillard older sisters. You can see the family DNA in there. Just superb aromas that are stunningly pure and so deep. Yet playful and accessible. Incense, candied flowers, fresh bowls of perfectly ripe cherries and loads of smokey minerals. It's truly top notch riveting aromas.
The palate is an exercise in freshness, stunningly vivid fruit and the best tannins I have ever experienced in a young Clos de Mez. It is stunningly juicy and fresh with top notch finesse and elegance. It has that 2015 richness and heft but has so much energy and linearity that it could be from 16 or 17 rather than 15. It has sweet dark cherries on the palate with incredible focus and my god is this a juicy wine. The palate is just so so elegant with amazing velvety and sweet tannins. Dark fruit, flowers and spice echo on the finish.
Below is the 91 Points Vinous Review.
"Dark ruby. Ripe cherry and dark berries on the smoke-tinged nose, along with a suggestion of
The Ageworthy Wines of Clos de Mez
To understand how incredible it is to have a wine like this at this estate you need to know a bit of the history if the estate and how it came to be.
I've been selling the brilliant and complex Beaujolais of Clos de Mez for years after being introduced
to them by the brilliant Jeremy Seysses of Domaine Dujac. They are amongst the most age-worthy wines in Beaujolais. But I've never really had one that was entering maturity. I firmly believed these wines had to be aged but didn't know how long. We sold the 2008s and that is the most difficult vintage in Beaujolais I can remember. Marie Elodie, owner and winemaker of Clos de Mez, made one of the best efforts of the vintage but in 2008 the tannins beat the fruit in the race and that's not a good example of a mature Clos de Mez. It's was also only her 3rd vintage. To prepare for today's offer I opened up the 2011 Clos de Mez Morgon "Chateau Gaillard" and it was easily the best Clos de Mez I've ever had. I had not had that bottle in 4 years as well. My last note said it needed age. Fast forward and the wine finally had a massive ROI, and that investment is piddling for what you get, but you have to wait, and I think 8-10 years is the magic number. The thing is, 2011 is not a great Beaujolais vintage. It's very good but it's not a top vintage. Her 12s/13s and 14s all will be wonderful wines but I would not drink them until at least 2020/2021/2022. They will then hang on and mature for a decade more. These are twenty year Beaujolais! Maybe longer
The Clos de Mez Story
Marie-Elodie's family is from Fleurie and she used to go back there for the holidays and had fond memories of the region. Her mother and grandmother had 17 hectares but it was all sold to a co-op. They took exquisite care of the vineyard. She lived in Paris and when she came home to Fleurie in her youth, communing with nature and being in the vineyard influenced Marie-Elodie tremendously. She decided after her grandmother died, when she was now in Lyon at 15, that she wanted to become a winemaker. Her dad would take care of the marketing and she would later make the wine after she finished school. Sadly her father died at a young age and she has to do it all on her own. She trained in Beaujolais, the Cotes-du-Rhone and finally Burgundy where she learned whole cluster fermentation and single varietal winemaking. Marie-Elodie was making Clos Vougeot of very high quality in Burgundy and she told herself she could never make wines of this level of quality at her Domaine back in Beaujolais. She then went to a wine tasting that changed her life while she was working in Vougeot and the star of the tasting was a 1911 Morgon. It had aged as well as great Grand Cru Burgundy has the idea of Clos de Mez was born. It took me almost 7 years to really get these wines. Marie-Elodie knew what she was doing the whole time she finally it's paying off in the bottle. Thing is these will age maybe even 25-30 years. They have that type of structure. They can be pleasant young but the real complexity and mindblowing quality comes with bottle age.
2015 Clos de Mez Fleurie "Mademoiselle M" - $25.99 ($95.96 4-pack) (*Included Tariff $2.12)
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