Philippe Roty's 2006 Cote De Nuits Villages Queue de Hareng – from two steep Brochon vineyards next to Gevrey’s Les Evocelles, and whose site name I neglected to mention in my 2005 vintage report in issue 170 – shows kinship with its better-known and distinguished Gevrey neighbor in its combination of bright, tart cherry fruit with floral and overtly chalky mineral notes. Brightness here goes hand-in-hand with creaminess of texture, and in its long, buoyant finish, this adds pungently smoky and mouth-wateringly savory, saline elements. It should be worth following for at least 6-8 years. Amazingly, the top sites in Fixin are just on the other side of this site from Gevrey. Yet their wines nearly always express minerality in an adamant manner; their textures are seldom if ever especially refined; and one usually gets austerity, not ingratiation. Philippe Roty is among the many growers to assert that under-ripe fruit rather than rot was what really drove his 2006 selection process. "But, hail or no hail, I do a strict triage regardless; and besides" he notes with a laugh, "it hails every year in at least one part of Marsannay." He picked in a relative hurry the last week of September, because "as far as I'm concerned, above 13% potential alcohol you have surmaturite, and that's not good." Besides, like the Mugneret sisters and a considerable number of other top-notch growers, Roty favors routinely – if only slightly – chaptalizing his entire range to promote longer and, he believes, flavor- and texture-enhancing fermentation. (While I have mentioned in the text of my tasting notes those wines that are part of the personal domaine of Philippe Roty and bottled under his name, I have not reflected this in the naming of the wines, as the same label is used for those as for the Domaine Joseph Roty wines and they are all vinified and aged together by the same team.) Importer: Alain Junguenet, Wines of France, Mountainside, NJ; tel. (908) 654-6173