Domaine des Heritiers du Comte Lafon Macon-Villages 2023

Received in Original Carton

91 points CellarTracker Member

Served by the glass at Aldo Sohm in Manhattan. Light yellow color. Lemon curd, honey, garrigue, and subtle shortbread. Smooth, dry palate. Nice structure from the vibrant acidity.

I was pleasantly surprised by this Chardonnay. Definitely an excellent QPR. July 13, 2024

90 points CellarTracker Member

Light golden yellow in color. Full, forward & attractive nose of ripe fruit aromas of lemons, apples & lemon curd with overtones of minerals & floral notes, stony, chalky & a slight hint of toasty oak. Medium-light bodied with a very good concentration of well balanced & smooth texture, ripe fruit flavors of lemons, apples & pears with minerals & a hint of oak. Lingering finish. Drinks quite well at present although it should develop slightly further with additional aging. August 31, 2024

The fruit for this Macon-Village comes from two plots around the villages of Uchizy and Chardonnay that don’t go into the single vineyard bottlings. The vines are planted in clay and chalk soils that have an average age of 25 years and are situated at an elevation between 650–900 feet above sea level. One third of the blend was aged in a stainless steel tank, while the other two-thirds spent time in old neutral foudres. Like all Les Héritiers du Comte Lafon wines, it shows the minerality Chardonnay can achieve in the Macon, especially in the hands of the white Burgundy master, Dominique Lafon.

It is intended for early and easy drinking with vibrant apple and pear flavors, a rounded texture on the medium to full-bodied palate and fresh acidity on the clean finish. After working hard to reclaim the Lafon family vineyards in and around Meursault, and re-establishing the Lafon name into one of the most prestigious and important in all of Burgundy, Dominique set his sights on the Mâconnais region in southern Burgundy. He realized there were actually several great terroirs from which he could produce wonderful Chardonnay at a fraction of the price of his Domaine des Comtes Lafon wines. So the family purchased 14 hectares of vineyards across different parcels in Mâconnais. He farms them biodynamically, as he'd been doing since 1998 in the Cote d'Or, and now crafts seven different Chardonnays under the Les Héretiers du Comte Lafon label. In 2006, he promoted his long-time apprentice, Caroline Gon as head winemaker of the domaine.