Lucien Le Moine Clos Des Ormes 2021

The manufacturer
Behind Lucien le Moine in Beaune you find the oenologist and winemaker Mounir – a “savager” who, since the 1999 vintage, has been completely uncompromising in producing the sublime from a number of Burgundy’s great appellations – and his wife Rotem. He is in his early 30s and a Christian Lebanese, while his wife is from Israel.
After completing his oenology studies in Montpellier and a few years as a cellar master at a monastery in Israel, where his wife's parents supplied cheese... , he came to Burgundy in 1995 to work with the grapes he clearly preferred: Pinot Noir and Chardonnay. Here he was employed as a cellar master in one of the largest wine companies in Burgundy and in this way got his daily work done in many of the best wine cellars in Burgundy. He considers the wine growers in Burgundy to be very skilled at growing their vines and harvesting their excellent grapes. But where he believes the chain breaks down is during the vinification and especially during the maturation of the wines. Wine growers can often ruin wines due to bad barrels or outdated techniques. An idea crossed his mind: Every year he will buy absolute top wines from selected producers on 1st Cru and Grand Cru vineyards and take them over immediately after alcoholic fermentation has finished at the wine growers. He will then vinify them further in his own cellar in Beaune – built in the 17th century – exclusively in new classic “pièces” (228 l oak barrels) from Burgundy.
The idea for Lucien le Moine wines was created, and the first vintage was 1999.

Both the whites and the reds are matured on their lees (sediment), something that Mounir believes is crucial to the wine's typicity: It is the lees that give the wine its richness, structure and character from the terroir, and the wine must therefore remain on its lees as long as possible during vinification. A weekly batonnage (stirring) is carried out.
The malolactic fermentation takes place quite late in the spring and means that the wine does not need to be artificially preserved (e.g. with sulfur).
All wines are bottled directly from cask without pumping or filtering – for 1999 in December 2000 and for 2000 in January-March 2002.
His first vintage was, as mentioned, 1999, and it is no exaggeration to say that Mounir's wines were brilliantly received – both by wine enthusiasts and wine writers.
The vines woke up early in the spring and the ripening period was long. The white wines from the 1999 vintage were generally delicate and harmonious with good softness and freshness, and the red wines had good structure, with intense tannins and a great ripening potential. The 2000 vintage is generally softer with good fruitiness, sweetness and finesse, and it develops faster than 1999. 2001 looks to be a mix of 1999 and 2000 in terms of style.