Domaine Koji et Jae Hwa Bourgogne Pinot Noir Vieilles Vignes 2023 750ml

In Burgundy's most abundant harvest on record, Koji Nakada held his 1908-planted Pinot Noir to 30 hectolitres per hectare.

This is the estate-fruit Bourgogne of Koji Nakada and Jae Hwa Park, bottled under the white Domaine Koji et Jae Hwa label rather than the Lou Dumont négociant label. The vines sit in two 0.24-hectare parcels near Nuits-Saint-Georges, bought in July 2012 as the couple's first purchase after twelve years of making wine from bought grapes: Les Argillières, planted in 1908, and a second parcel of roughly fifty-year-old vines beside it. Their Japanese importer, Nouvelles Sélections, records the farming as organic from 2012, certified by Bureau Veritas in 2016, within an estate that moved to biodynamics in 2019 and ploughs part of its land by horse.

The 2023 numbers come from the same importer's tech note. Yield was 30 hl/ha in a year Jasper Morris calls the hottest on record, with Pinot Noir crops so large that many growers thinned twice; the Côte de Nuits then had to choose between picking in the late-August heat or waiting for the storm of 12 September. Half the fruit was destemmed, fermentation ran on indigenous yeasts, and the wine spent 18 months in Chassin Grand Fin barrels, half new and half once-used, with the new-barrel portion fermented in barrel as well. It was bottled without fining or filtration.

Nakada founded Lou Dumont on 7 July 2000 and works from the old Fourrier family cellars in Gevrey-Chambertin. Henri Jayer told him in 2003 to put his own identity into the wine, and the domaine has since grown parcel by parcel to 6.5 hectares in Burgundy by 2024.

In the glass

No critic has yet published a note on the 2023; the closest reference is Greg Sherwood MW on the 2022 (May 2025, 93+/100), which he found a little earthy and dark-fruited, with pink musk, lilac, damson plum, bright acids wrapped in silky tannins and a long limestone finish. For the vintage itself, Morris describes the 2023 Côte de Nuits reds as agreeably juicy, full of fruit, with refined tannins and alcohols mostly between 12.5 and 13.5 percent.

When to open

Morris reads 2023 as a vintage lovely to drink young; the 2022 was 12.5 percent. Our suggestion: open from now, around 15 °C, with a short decant, and keep a bottle to 2030.

At the table

Our suggestion: yakitori with salt, duck breast, or a mushroom risotto, following the lighter extraction of this cuvée.

Quick facts

Provenance

Sourced from the Japanese importer.

Sources: Nouvelles Sélections (Japanese importer); front label; Greg Sherwood MW (May 2025); Inside Burgundy (Jasper Morris, 2023 vintage overview); 88 Bamboo