Vincent Girardin, Santenay Premier Cru (Burgundy, France) 2016

 This terrific wine is just one click down from the astonishing 2016 Les Gravières, and if this is the only one of the two you can find to buy, you should snap it up without hesitation.  It is actually a bit the better of the two in terms of purity of fruit, as it doesn’t show the hint of brett shown by the Les Gravières, though it can’t quite match that wine for sheer complexity.  I hasten to add, however, that this is amazingly complex for such a young wine from a second-tier village in Burgundy.  Very expressive in both aroma and flavor, it also displays truly wonderful texture, with tannins that are so fine in grain that they seem perfectly interwoven with the fruit and acidity.